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MEMOIR 



JOSIAH QUINCY 



JAMES AVALKER, D.D. 



^tom ii^t " ^rotttbings of tlje Pinssac^sttts historical ^ocictu " 
For 1866-1867. 



, CAMBRIDGE: 

PRINTED BY JOHN WILSON AND SON. 
1867. 






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MEMOIR 



JOSIAH QUINCY. 



Edmund Quincy, the emigrant ancestor of the Quincy family 
in this country, came from Achurch, Northamptonshire, Eng- 
land. He arrived here Sept. 4, 1633, in the same vessel with 
the Rev. John Cotton, and several laymen "of good estate." 

His descendants have not been numerous ; but, as many of 
them were educated men and in public life, the name has 
always been distinguished. Josiah Quincy, jun., so called be- 
cause he died in the lifetime of his father, and because his 
name thus written is indissolubly associated with the early 
struggles which led to American Independence, was of the 
fifth generation. He was then a young lawyer in Boston, 
rapidly rising into note. Of an ardent temperament, jealous 
for the rights and liberties of the Colonies, bold, eloquent, 
incorruptible, he was eminently fitted to become a leader in 
the impending Revolution. He was married, in October, 1769, 
to Abigail Phillips, the eldest daughter of William Phillips, 
one of the most distinguished and successful of the Boston 
merchants of that day. They resided in Washington (then 
Marlborough) Street, nearly opposite the old Province House, 
where was born, Feb. 4, 1772, their son Josiah, the subject of 
the following memoir. 



4 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

In the autumn of 1774, the father embarked for England, 
in the hope of serving his country abroad, and at the same 
time recruiting his own health, which had begun to give way 
under the pressure of professional and public cares. The 
first part of this hope was fulfilled, but not the second ; he 
died on his passage home, April 26, 1775, only a few hours 
before the ship entered the harbor of Gloucester. The battle 
of Lexington had taken place in the preceding week; Boston 
was occupied by the British troops, and all intercourse with 
the country suspended. For this reason, the inhabitants of 
Gloucester proceeded to bury him with such marks of respect 
as the times would permit.* Everywhere, as a cotemporary 
tells us, " the multitude of the people were his mourners ; " 
and he is still remembered with that peculiar interest which 
attaches to a proto-martyr, especially when, as in this case, he 
is cut off in the midst of a career of great promise. 

On sailing from Boston, eight months before, he had left 
his wife in charge of the family, which then consisted of a 
son and a daughter. She had remained in town for some 
time after its military occupation by General Gage, being 
detained by the dangerous illness of both of these children. 
The daughter died April 13 ; after which, with her son, she 
hastened to join her parents, who, in the distracted state of 
the country in and about Boston, had retired to Norwich, in 
Connecticut. Here she received the intelligence of her hus- 
band's death, — a great sorrow, which cast its shadow over 
her whole subsequent life. All the accounts of this lady 
which have come down to us, represent her as being one of 
the most esteemed and attractive persons in the elevated 
circle in which she moved. But the heart of the young 
widowed mother was never weaned from its first love. " She 
survived her husband three and twenty years ; his fame and 
memory being the chief solace of her life, and the perfect 

* His remains were afterwards removed to the burial-ground in Quincy. 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 5 

fulfilment of parental duty to their surviving child, its only- 
object."* 

"With this child, who had then just completed his third 
year, she continued to make part of her father's family, not 
only during his stay at Norwich, but after his return to 
Boston, until her son entered college. It was probably the 
circumstance that she thus had no proper home of her own, 
which made her less averse to placing him at a public school 
at the early age of six. Other things also conspired to recom- 
mend the step. The school proposed was Phillips Academy, 
in Andover, which her uncle and her cousin of that place, 
with the assistance of her father, had just founded. There he 
would always be near, and under the constant supervision of, 
those relatives ; and there, also, the mother, in her frequent 
visits to them, would have opportunity to watch over his pro- 
gress. The Academy was first opened April 30, 1778; and 
young Quincy was admitted early in the following month, his 
name standing the twenty-seventh on its roll. 

During the eight years of his connection with that sem- 
inary, he boarded with the clergyman of the parish, the Rev. 
Mr. French. Such were the kindnesses and indulgences he 
there met with, that, in after-life, he always looked back 
on the Andover parsonage as a second home, and indeed as 
the only real home of his boyhood. f But, as might be pre- 
sumed from the extreme youth of the pupil, things did not 
get on so well for some time in the school-room. The pre- 
ceptor was Eliphalet Pearson, afterwards a professor in Har- 
vard College, and at a later period in Andover Theological 
Institution, — a strict and vigorous disciplinarian of the old 
regime. Mr. Quincy, in a letter written not many years 
before his death, gives the following account of the methods 
adopted by this teacher, and of their effect on himself: — 

* " Memoir of the Life of Josiah Quincy, jun., bj- his Son," p. 29. 
t , For a full account of his obligations to the family, see Mr. Quincy's letter to Dr. 
Sprague, in "Annals of the American Pulpit," vol. ii. pp. 44-48. 



6 MEMOIR OP JOSIAH QUINCY. 

" He had the confidence of the parents and the public from his 
thoroughness. No boy was permitted to learn B, before he was per- 
fect iu all the relations of A. I was a great hand at marbles, and 
hunting the striped squirrel from the Academy to the parsonage ; but, 
as to hunting down the pages of Cheever's Accidence, then our first 
book, I had neither will nor power. But there was the rule, — you 
must be perfect in it. I was kept in that book the whole of my 
seventh, and part of my eighth, year, until it was odious to me ; and 
even now the very name of Cheever is, to my imagination, something 
of an ogre. Dr. Pearson's discipline was strict and severe, and, though 
naturally of a kind temperament, he governed by fear. It was the 
fashion of the time, imported from England, and thought to be essen- 
tial to the advancement of learning. Dr. Pearson was a full convert 
to it, and an expert practitioner. I must be excused from writing on 
this point, as it would compel me renovare dolores. But, though a 
great sufferer under the ancient system of discipline, I must say it had 
some advantages over the modern." 

The boy's progress in his studies for two or three years 
being slow, his teacher advised his mother to give np the 
plan of sending him to college. Happily for him, and happily 
for the College, she was not so easily discouraged. In due 
time, the natural development of his faculties, and of his char- 
acteristic energy and determination to succeed, began to put 
him in better relations with his books. A few months before 
he left the Academy, Dr. Pearson was called to a professor- 
ship at Cambridge ; his place as preceptor being supplied by 
Dr. Ebenezer Pemberton, an experienced teacher of much 
repute in those days.* Under the instructions of this gen- 
tleman, he completed his preparatory course, and entered 
Harvard College in 1786, at the age of fourteen. There he 
immediately took a high position as a scholar, and, though 
one of the youngest in the class, graduated, in 1790, with its 
first honors. 



* Ebenezer Pemberton, LL.D., grandson of the Old South pastor of the same 
name, had received his education in the College of New Jersey, and had been a teacher 
in that colony. President Madisou and Aaron Burr are said to have been among his 
early pupils. • *' 



MEMOIR OP JOSIAH QUINCY. 7 

Immediately after graduating, he began the study of law 
in the office of the Hon. William Tudor, then a leading mem- 
ber of the Boston bar. His mother, as already intimated, had 
taken a house of her own when he entered college, that he 
might have an independent home in his vacations. The house 
was in Court Street, on ground now occupied by Tudor's 
Building. She resided there until after he had become a 
student at law, and then removed to a house in Federal 
Street, the site of which, with the garden, is now Sullivan 
Place. Soon afterward she established herself in a more 
spacious and eligible mansion, situated on the corner of Pearl 
and High Streets, which her father purchased in 1792 of 
the executors of Mr. Merchant ; and there she continued to 
reside until her death. Meanwhile her son had completed 
his legal studies in the summer of 1793, and was admitted to 
the bar. At the Commencement in the same year, he also 
took his second degree at Harvard ; and, according to a cus- 
tom of that day, delivered what was then called ''The Mas- 
ters' Oration," his subject being "The Ideal Superiority of 
the Present Age in Literature and Politics." 

Mr. Quincy was now twenty-one. His education, both 
academical and professional, had been accomplished, not only 
creditabl}'^, but with distinction ; his family connections placed 
him at once in the best society, and he was looked upon as 
a young man of large expectations ; to all which must be 
added, a handsome person, full of life and health. Yet it was 
at this age and in these circumstances that we find him lay- 
ing down for himself a strict and almost stoical rule of life and 
duty. " It is not," he writes to a classmate, soon after they 
had left college, " it is not the natural brilliancy of wit and the 
flashes of imagination (which, by the world, is denominated 
genius) that are, in my opinion, to be envied. It is firmness 
of nerve, — that strength of mind which capacitates us for in- 
tense application and hard, laborious attention, — which is the 
soil where every laurel and every virtue is cultivated with 



8 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

success." He affixed to his study-table, that it might be con- 
tinually before his eyes, the following epigraph from Cicero : 
Prceclare Socrates hanc viam ad gloriam proximam et quasi 
compendiariam dicebat esse ; si quis id ageret, ut, qualis haberi 
vellet, talis esset. And, to show hoAv thoroughly his princi- 
ples were carried into eifect, a single anecdote will suffice. 
When a young lawyer in Boston, he joined a party who met 
at a fixed hour in the morning to play billiards, for exercise 
and amusement merely. He was fond of the game, and soon 
found he was looking at his watch to see if the appointed 
hour had arrived. This disposition alarmed him; he feared 
he should become too much interested in games of skill or 
chance, and immediately left the party and never met them 
again, notwithstanding the raillery of his associates. 

That such a man would succeed in whatever he seriously 
undertook, was as certain as any thing can be in this world. 
What Avould have been the degree of his success in the law, 
if he had given himself wholly to it, and continued in it long 
enough to compete for its highest distinctions and rewards, 
we have no means of determining ; for his attention was soon 
called away to politics and public life. He is understood 
to have regretted in after-years the last-mentioned circum- 
stance; but, as it would seem, without reason. He undoubt- 
edly yielded to the promptings of his nature ; and these, 
when distinctly pronounced, are the best guide in such cases. 
And, besides, it is easy to see that his mind, though active on 
all subjects, was better fitted for that kind of activity which 
has to do with affairs, than with that which has to do with 
the settlement of principles and rules, or the investigation of 
truth. Then, too, he was his father's son ; and there was this 
clause in his father's will: " I give to my son, when he shall 
arrive to the age of fifteen years, Algernon Sidney's Works, 
John Locke's Works, Lord Bacon's Works, Gordon's Taci- 
tus, and Gate's Letters. May the spirit of liberty rest upon 
him ! " ** 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 9 

Under these influences, it is not strange that his thoughts 
and his ambition were early turned to the State. Meanwhile 
the community had begun to be agitated by novel and excit- 
ing questions, which threatened, in the opinion of many, the 
stability of our free institutions.* The contested adoption 
of the Constitution by the several States had given rise to 
the Federal and Democratic parties; and the antagonism thus 
occasioned was more and more intensified by the different 
views entertained in this country of the French Revolution, 
as it went on from one excess to another. All Mr. Quincy's 
convictions and tastes and associations inclined him to the 
conservative or Federal side, as representing the American 
idea of liberty, in contradistinction to the French idea of lib- 
erty. And, as it was not his habit to do things by halves or 
wnth reserves, he at once became an active member of the 
party, and from that time identified its interests with those of 
the whole people, and never wavered in his loyalty to it, 
through good report and through evil report. " To the day 
of his death," as his son has told us, "he professed and called 
himself a Federalist, and nothing else. Though, after the 
dispersion of the Federal party, he voted for the candidates 
of difi'erent parties, according to his estimation of their merits, 
he never regarded himself as belonging to any of them, — not 
even to the Republican party of his old age, though he gave 

* As early as 1792, Mr. Quincy wrote to a friend what may now be regarded as 
prophecy. After noticing tlie disorder and violence attending at that time an election 
in New York, he goes on: " Whether Clinton has the advantage of Jay, or the Chief 
Justice of the Governor, neither you nor I have the materials or the inclination to decide. 
But if such animosity can be excited, such tumults fomented, by a dispute concerning 
the governmental chair of a single State, what will in some future period result from 
passions equally strong, minds in all probability less well-regulated, and numbers im- 
mensely increased, when roused by the claimants of a four-years' crown, with their 
blood rising in proportion to the dignity and importance of the office; when the South 
shall crown an Eumenes, and the North an Antipater. If such materials so disposed 
do not raise a conflagration, if such opportunities do not excite a Catiline to blow about 
the seeds of contention, or a Faux to apply a torch to this combustible pile, it will be 
because nature, or its God, has new-modelled the constitution of man. Our country 
seems to have this issue upon trial, — Whether man has virtue sufficient to restrain lib- 
erty from running into licentiousness." 

2 



10 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

his vote and the weight of his influence to its candidates and 
its policy."* 

Mr. Quincy was married June 6, 1797, to EHza Susan 
Morton. Her father, Colonel John Morton, was a wealthy 
merchant in New York at the breaking out of the War of 
Independence. He was a zealous patriot, so liberal in his 
loans to the Government as to be called by the British, " The 
Rebel Banker," by which his own fortune was considerably 
impaired. He had now been dead sixteen years. His widow, 
the bride's mother, resided in a house at the corner of Pine and 
Water Streets, in New York, where the marriage ceremony 
took place ; President Smith, from the College at Princeton, 
New Jersey, officiating on the occasion. From an autobiog- 
raphy of her early life left by Mrs. Quincy, I copy an account 
of the bridal journey to Boston, which reads strangely in 
these days of steamboats and railroads : — 

" We travelled pleasantly in a private carriage and four, and reached 
Marlborough, Massachusetts, on the evening of the eighth day of our 
journey. The next day, at noon, we saw a carriage approach, which 
brought Mr. Quincy's mother, accompanied by his cousins, Miriam 
Phillips and Hannah Storer, whom she had selected as appropriate 
attendants on her new daughter. Mrs. Quincy was then fifty-three 
years of age, still retaining traces of great personal beauty, with a fine 
expression of countenance, and cordial and graceful manners. Her 
dress united richness and elegance with propriety and taste. I was 
much agitated at the thought of this meeting ; but, from the moment I 
saw her, and received her first welcome and embrace, I felt at ease, 
and sure that we should promote each other's happiness. Mr. Quincy's 
satisfaction was complete when he beheld me with his mother, and 
surrounded by approving friends. The next day, we had a very gay 
journey to Boston in the carriage with Mrs. Quincy and her com- 



* This extract is from an interesting and valuable memoir of Mr. Quincy, which 
appeared in the " New-York Daily Tribune " for July 8, 1864, a little more than a week 
after his death. It is understood to have been written by his son, Mr. Edmund Quincy; 
and the reader will find that we are under repeated obligations to it. Through the 
kindness of the family, we have also had access to letters and other manuscripts, which 
have been of great use in preparing this biographical notice. 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 11 

panions, sending our luggage by the one which had brought us from 
New York. We drove over Cambridge Bridge, and through Boston, 
to the residence of Mrs. Qiiincy, in Pearl Street, where she again 
welcomed us to her home." 

A happier matrimonial connection could not have been 
formed. By her delicacy of character, calm judgment, and 
literary culture, Mrs. Quincy was admirably qualified to pre- 
side over her husband's house with grace and dignity, and at 
the same time to enter into and share his best thoughts, and 
be his companion and adviser in all things. But their bright 
prospects, after a few short months, were suddenly clouded 
by the sickness and death of Mr. Quincy's mother. The 
event was unexpected, and widely deplored; yet all felt it to 
be a natural and impressive termination of the great purpose 
of her life, which was to bring up her son to be worthy of his 
name, and see him established in the world. Her work was 
done.* 

In 1798, Mr. Quincy delivered the oration on the anniver- 
sary of American Independence, before the citizens of Boston. 
This is the first of his acknowledged productions which have 
been transmitted to us by the press. It is also, both in mat- 
ter and manner, a characteristic performance, and seems to 
have attracted considerable attention at the time ; for the copy 
now before us is a Philadelphia reprint of the Boston edition. 
The orator begins by recounting the principal causes which 
endangered the liberties of the Colonies ; and then shows, or 
undertakes to show, that similar causes were still at work, 
under other names and connections, threatening the liberties 
of the United States. It was no longer England and her 
emissaries, but France and her emissaries. '' The black 
whirlwind, which spreads disorder and desolation over the 
face of Europe, curls threatening towards our shores." In 



* In the " Columbian Centinel " for March 28, 1798, there is an obituary notice of 
this hid}', from the pen of Dr. Kirkland. 



12 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. • 

one word, it is an earnest and fearless statement of the im- 
minent perils of the cotmtry, as apprehended at that time, 
from the Federal point of view. 

At the election for members of Congress, in 1800, Mr. 
Quincj was the Federal candidate in the Suffolk district. 
He was then but twenty-eight ; at a time, too, when years 
weighed much more than they do now as a qualification for 
office. And besides, party lines, at least with the mass of 
the people, were not yet so distinctly drawn as afterwards ; 
a circumstance which enabled the supporters of the rival 
candidate, Dr. William Eustis, to urge with greater effect 
his larger experience and his Revolutionary services. Dr. 
Eustis was chosen b}'- a small majority. In April, 1804, Mr. 
Quincy was elected a member of the Massachusetts Senate, 
and took an active part in the business of that body during 
its summer session. But in the following November, before 
his term of service there had expired, he was again put in 
competition with Dr. Eustis for the office of representative 
in Congress. This time his friends prevailed by a decided 
vote, as they also did at his tliree successive re-elections ; 
after which he voluntarily retired, partly for political, and 
partly for domestic and personal reasons. 

In reviewing Mr. Quincy's Congressional career, every one 
must be impressed by the vigor, intelligence, and inflexible 
constancy with which he maintained what he conceived to be 
the vital interests of the country. Reference is often made 
to a few vehement expressions and acts of his, provoked by 
the extreme measures of the day, as if they were a fair speci- 
men of his public conduct ; but this is not the case. Scarcely 
a single question of importance came up for consideration by 
Congress, during the eight years he was a member of that 
body, on which he did not speak at length, discussing it on 
its merits. His language is always terse and strong ; his 
information full and exact, showing how thoroughly he had 
prepared himself for the work by a careful study of the his- 



MEMOIE OP JOSIAH QUINCY. 13 

tory and resources of this country and its foreign relations, 
of the dangers and safeguards of free governments, and of 
international law. As a parliamentary orator, judged by his 
printed speeches, he stands among the foremost this country 
has produced. Where his only aim is to enlighten or con- 
vince, the reasoning is often singularly compact and lucid ; 
as in his speech " on Fortifying the Coasts and Harbors," and 
in that " on Establishing a Navy." Occasionally, as in what 
he says of New England and his native State, in a speech ''on 
Submission to the Edicts of Great Britain and France," he 
indulges in bursts of enthusiasm and flights of fancy, which 
were much applauded at the time, and are still read with 
pleasure. In bitter and scornful sarcasm he was unrivalled, 
the consciousness of which tempted him to resort to this 
mode of attack oftener, perhaps, than was well ; but the de- 
bate " on the Influence of Place and Patronage " afforded him 
ample and legitimate scope for it. It has been said of the 
speech made by hira on this occasion, that it ought to be 
printed and glazed, and hung up in every ofiice of every 
office-holder in the land. John Adams, though dissenting 
from several of its positions, pronounced ''the eloquence mas- 
terly, and the satire inimitable," unsurpassed by any thing in 
Juvenal or Swift. 

Mr. Quiucy has been sometimes blamed for the violence of 
his attacks on the Administration. This is one of those points 
on which the party in power and the party out of power can 
never be expected to agree. Even as a question of general 
casuistry, it is not easy to settle, on purely ethical grounds, 
precisely how far such opposition can be carried in great 
national issues, and especially in time of war, without becom- 
ing factious or unpatriotic. When the Emperor Alexander 
was in London, in 1814, he told one of the great Whig lords 
that he liked the working of the Opposition Party, in Eng- 
land, on the whole ; " but would it not be still better," he 
asked, " if they were to communicate their objections to the 



14 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

ministry in private?" Of course, Mr. Quincy entertained no 
scruples of this kind ; indeed, to a people accustomed to free 
speech and a free press, the suggestion is simply ludicrous. 
The only practical rule would seem to be, for every one to 
expose and denounce what he conceives to be alarming public 
abuses. If the abuses really exist, the people should know 
it ; if not, let the charge be refuted. To the objection that 
the best governments may be weakened or obstructed by 
such attacks, and this, too, in times of difficulty and peril, 
when their energies are taxed to the utmost, the answer is 
obvious. Where the people are used to unrestrained party 
recrimination, they soon learn how to understand it, and 
make the proper allowances ; nay, more, if unreasonable or 
ill-timed, it is much more likely to injure the party from 
which it proceeds, than the party against which it is di- 
rected. And, besides, even if some inconvenience is occa- 
sioned thereby, it must be accepted as a necessary condition 
of liberty ; or, at any rate, as part of the price usually paid 
for it. 

Never, in the history of this country, has the Opposition 
felt called upon to speak out more boldly than at the time 
when Mr. Quincy was in Congress. The old leaders of the 
Federal party had taken an active part in laying the founda- 
tions of the existing Government; tliey had also been among 
the steady supporters of Washington's policy. It has some- 
times been said, that they were the friends of order, rather 
than of liberty ; but there is not much ground for this dis- 
tinction. They had just seen the wild and impracticable 
notions of liberty prevalent in France end in a remorseless 
military despotism; and, to their excited imaginations, things 
in this country were rapidly drifting in the same direction. 
Liberty, as well as order, at least to their apprehension, was 
in imminent danger ; but what could they do to save either ? 
Reduced to an inconsiderable minority in the national and 
most of the State governments, neither their counsels nor 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 15 

their votes were of any avail; leaving them no power but that 
of protest, pushed to the verge of resistance. 

Whoever is familiar Avith the newspapers and political 
pamphlets of that day, will not need to be informed, that Mr. 
Quincy, in his most solemn warnings and vehement denuncia- 
tions, seldom, if ever, went beyond the party he represented. 
Indeed, there were questions on which he did not go so far. 
In 1808, he voted with the majority on the resolution, 'Hhat 
the United States cannot, without a sacrifice of their rights, 
honor, and independence, submit to the edicts of Great Brit- 
ain and France ; " and, in 1811, on the bill for augmenting the 
land forces. Again, in 1812, he not only voted for the Gov- 
ernment measure '' to establish a navy," but made one of his 
ablest speeches in its favor. He also professed his readiness 
at all times to intrust the Executive with abundant means 
for putting the country in a state of defence. Moreover, 
injustice has often been done to the Federal Opposition in 
Congress, by inferring its general character from single and 
extreme acts ; in proof of which it would be easy to adduce 
testimony not to be suspected of partiality. A single in- 
stance will suffice. The debate on the short Embargo im- 
mediately preceding the declaration of war against Great 
Britain had been continued until seven o'clock in the evening, 
and the Administration was anxious to hurry the bill through. 
IL this state of things, Mr. Quincy expressed a desire to speak 
on the question, so extremely interesting to his immediate 
constituents, but was unable to do so from fatigue, unless the 
House would consent to an adjournment. An adjournment 
was therefore advocated by Mr. Williams, of South Carolina, 
and Mr. Macon, of North Carolina, both of them leading 
Democrats ; the former assigning as a reason for the indul- 
gence, that " the deportment of the other side of the House 
had, during the whole of tlie session, been very gentlemanly 
towards the majority." Mr. Macon went farther still : " He 
thought the minority had acted with more propriety than he 



16 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

ever knew in a minority." Even Mr. Wriglit, of Maryland, 
though opposed to the adjournment, " was willing to acknowl- 
edge the minority had conducted with propriety." 

But occasionally there were stormy times. The following 
is an extract from a letter from Washington, dated Jan. 20, 
1809:* — 

" Yesterday and to-day there has been in the House of Representa- 
tives one of the warmest and most impassioned discussions ever wit- 
nessed by a legislative assembly, on the bill for the next meeting of 
Congress. Mr. Quincy made an attack on the Administration, which 
called forth all the virulence of the Executive phalanx; and, to-day, 
Campbell and Jackson went into the House, with the apparent deter- 
mination to reduce him to the same necessity to which Gardenier 
was forced last session. Irritated by his attacks, and unable to answer 
him, they poured out upon him a torrent of gross and illiberal abuse. 
Mr. Quincy, in reply, stated specifically his ground, and tokl them that 
his honor was of little worth if it lay in the mouths of such men, and 
not in his own conduct. He was no duellist. He had the honor to 
represent, not only a wise, a moral, a powerful and intellectual, but a 
religious people ; that, among them, to avenge wrongs of words, by 
resorting to the course of conduct to which it was obviously intended 
to reduce him, was so far from being honorable, that it would be a dis- 
grace to any man. To gain the temporary applause of such men as 
his assailants, whom he could only pity and despise, he should not 
sacrifice his own principles, nor forfeit the respect of those whose good 
opinion was the highest reward of his life. If they expected by such 
artifices to deter him from doing his duty, they would find themselves 
mistaken. Where he was known, nothing they could say would injure 
him ; and where they were known, he believed the effect would not be 
greater." 

Brought up in New England, and professing to be a man 
of moral and religious principle, he could, of course, take no 
other ground than he did on the subject of duelling; but his 
open and manly way of avowing it won general admiration. 
Mr. Buckrainster did but utter the common sentiment, when 

* First published in the "New England Palladium," Jan. 31, 1809. 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 17 

he said " he would rather be the author of that retort of his, 
than of all the speeches he ever made, however eloquent or 
effective." He also had another motive for beioig thus ex- 
plicit. Only a fortnight before, his friends in Boston and 
Quincy had been startled by a rumor, which, from the diffi- 
culty of communication at that time, remained uncontradicted 
for several days, that he had actually fallen in an affair of 
honor, so called. He was glad of an opportunity to set their 
minds at rest on that point. As, however, some fears were 
entertained of an attack in the streets, Mr. Lloyd insisted on 
arming him with a brace of pistols, carefully loaded by him- 
self, which he consented to wear for a few days, and then 
threw aside. He probably was never in any real danger; 
there was something in his look and bearing which did not 
encourage an assault. And, besides, it is interesting to know, 
that much of the indignation expressed against him on the 
floor of Congress did not grow out of personal or even party 
hostilit};', but was merely for political effect at home. One of 
the Western members was frank enough to tell him, that he 
was hated in his district more than any other man in the 
country, except perhaps Colonel Pickering. " So," says he, 
'' I must go on abusing you, or I shall lose my next election. 
But I hope we shall be good friends notwithstanding." 

How little he cared for such things appears from the fact, 
that, within a week after the scene just described, he gave 
occasion to another of the same kind. The latter, indeed, as 
the story is commonly told, would seem to have been little 
better than an act of Quixotism on his part; but it is because 
the circumstances which led to it, and his real objects, are 
kept out of sight : — 

"The facts," as his son tells us, " were these. General Lincoln, 
of the Revolution, was appointed Collector of Boston, by President 
Washington, and held the office down to 1809. His infirmities of age 
and health, however, had made him desirous of resigning his post ; and 
in November, 1806, he had sent in his resignation [or wish to resign]. 

8 



18 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

Mr. Jefferson asked hira, as a personal favor, to retain the place until 
the next March. To this he consented, but in March no successor was 
appointed ; and, after waiting till September, he again requested to be 
relieved, stating his entire inability to perform the duties of his office. 
To this communication he never received any answer at all ; and he 
was compelled to remain in office, although he had not been able to be 
in Boston for nearly a year. This office had thus been kept virtually 
vacant for more than two years, as a provision for General Henry 
Dnarborn, Mr. Jefferson's Secretary of War, after his term of office 
should have expired." * 

To Mr. Quincy's strict notions of public duty, this sort of 
favoritism in the bestowment of Executive patronage, involv- 
ing, as it did in the present instance, the retention in an 
important office for so long a time of a person known to be 
wholly incompetent to its duties, amounted to " a high misde- 
meanor," deserving the notice and action of Congress. Nor 
was this all. While he was meditating ^vhat to do, an article 
appeared in the " National Intelligencer," the organ of the 
Government, stigmatizing General Lincoln as " a Federalist, 
whom the forbearance of the Administration had long retained 
in office, in opposition to the wishes of a respectable class 
in the community." Incensed at the false impression which 
such a statement was calculated to make on the public mind, 
Mr. Quincy was determined that the whole truth should be 
known. Accordingly, he rose in his place in the House on 
that very morning, as soon as the business of the day began, 

* These facts are (;iven more at length, in a letter to Mr. Quincy from Benjamin 
Weld, Esq., Assistant-Collector of Boston, dated Jan. 19, 1809. The writer says, 
" Early in the month of November, 1806, General Lincoln wrote to the President of 
the United States, stating his infirmities and advanced years, and requested to resign 
at the end of the year. The President returned an answer which was received in 
December, which, after some flattering compliments on his Revolutionary services, 
requested the General to give him a little longer time to look out for a suitable char- 
acter to fill his office, and limited the time to the last of March following, beyond which, 
he flssarecZhim, he should not be detained. The General in reply said, ' The wishes of 
the President sliould be a law to him.'" General Lincoln's request was afterwards 
urgently renewed; but no attention whatever was paid to it for nearly two years. Mr. 
Weld says, " That the office has been kept for General D., there is not the least doubt ; 
he has intimated it himself to persons who have told me in confidence." 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 19 

and, after stating the facts he was prepared to prove, moved 
the two following resolutions : First, that the President be 
requested to communicate the correspondence respecting 
General Lincoln's resignation ; and, secondly, that a Com- 
mittee be appointed to inquire into the causes which have 
prevented that resignation from being accepted, and report 
the result. A violent debate ensued, and, when the vote 
was taken on the question, " Shall the Resolutions be adopt- 
ed?" it stood, yeas, 1; nays, 117. 

In looking back on this affair, we need not suppose that 
Mr. Quincy submitted his motion in the expectation that it 
would lead to an impeachment, or even so much as bring up 
the question in that form. Before the vote was taken, his 
main purpose had been accomplished, which was to expose 
the conduct of the President. Having done this, it would 
have been in order for him to withdraw his motion; but, as 
such a step might be construed into a shrinking from respon- 
sibility, he chose rather to let it take its course. Character- 
istically enough, he told the House, that " neither the asperities 
of his political opponents, nor the disagreement of his politi- 
cal friends, would change his mind on a subject which he had 
well considered. If he was in an error concerning the charge, 
or rather allegation, he had made, he was willing to stand 
before the nation in support of it. It gave him no sort of 
pain or anxiety." The motion was made at the opening of the 
morning's session, which then began at nine o'clock. At 
twelve o'clock the same day. General Dearborn's nomination 
was sent to the Senate.* 



* Mr. Randall, in his "Life of Thomas Jefferson," vol. iii. p. 289, dwells on the 
Revolutionary services of General Lincoln. But it was not for these that he was de- 
tained in office against his will by Mr Jefferson. Again, he says, it was no "hardship " 
to be complained of on the part of the General or his friends, that he continued to 
receive a salary of five thousand dollars a j'ear for doing nothing. Perhaps not; but, 
nevertheless, it might be connected with an abuse of Executive patronage; and, be- 
sides, the responsibility under the circumstances was felt and declared to be a "hard- 
ship." Finally, he saj's of Lincoln's resignation, that it was " never actually sent in 



20 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

There was also another passage in Mr. Quincy's Congres- 
sional life which deserves notice, because it has been made 
the ground of representing him as the first asserter in the 
National legislature of the right of secession. It occurred 
Jan. 14, 1811, in the debate on ''admitting the Territory of 
Orleans into the Union as an Independent State." In a con- 
stitutional argument on that question, he was led to say: — 

" ' I am compelled to declare it as my deliberate opinion, tkat, if this 
bill passes, tlie bonds of this Union are virtually dissolved ; that the 
States wliich compose it are free from their moral obligations ; and that 
as it will be the right of all, so it will be the duty of some, to prejiare 
definitely for a separation, — amicably if they can, violently if they 
must.' 

"Mr. Quincy was here called to order by Mr. Poindexter. 

" Mr. Quincy repeated and justified the remark he had made, which, 
to save all misapprehension, he committed to writing in the following 
words : ' If this bill passes, it is my deliberate opinion that it is virtu- 
ally a dissolution of this Union ; that it will free the States from their 
moral obligation ; and as it will be the right of all, so it will be the 
duty of some, definitely to prepare for a separation, amicably if they 
can, violently if they must.' 

"After some confusion, Mr. Poindexter required the decision of the 
Speaker, whether it was consistent with the propriety of debate, to use 
such an expression. He said it was radically wrong for any member 
to use arguments going to dissolve the Government, and tumble this 
body itself to dust and ashes. It would be found, from the gentleman's 
statement of his language, that he had declared the riglit of any por- 
tion of the people to separate — 

" Mr. Quincy wished the Speaker to decide ; for, if the gentleman 
was permitted to debate the question, he should lose one-half of his 
speech. 

" The Speaker decided, that great latitude in debate was generally 

until after the passage of the Enforcing Law," which took place about a fortnight only 
before the appointment of Dearborn. The statement is, perliaps, true so far as this, 
that Lincoln from courtesy contented himself with pressing his request, and allowed 
himself to be put ofi' until the passage of that Act. He is then understood to have 
written to the President, " that he had fought for the liberties of his country, and 
spent his best years in her service ; and that he was not, in his old age, to be made an 
instrument to violate what he had assisted to acquire." 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 21 

allowed ; and that, by way of argument against the bill, the first part 
of the gentleman's observations was admissible ; but the latter mem- 
ber of the sentence, viz., ' That it would be the duty of some States 
to prepare for a separation, amicably if they can, violently if they 
must,' was contrary to the order of debate. 

" Mr. Quincy appealed from this decision, and required the yeas 
and nays on the appeal. The question was thus stated : ' Is the de- 
cision of the Speaker correct ? ' And decided, fifty-three yeas ; fifty- 
six nays. So the decision of the Speaker was reversed ; Mr. Quincy's 
observations were declared to be in order, and he proceeded." * 

Such is the record. The first reflection suggested by it 
is, that the House, though composed of pohtical opponents 
in the proportion of two to one, pronounced his remarks " in 
order." No doubt many of them acted on the principle, that 
language eh'cited in the heat of an impassioned debate is not 
to be interpreted to the letter. Above all, the purpose, the 
drift of the speaker should be considered ; which, in the pres- 
ent case, was not to threaten, but to warn ; not a plot to 
destroy the Union, but anxiety to save it. On resuming his 
speech, Mr. Quincy said, " When I spoke of the separation 
of the States as resulting from the violation of the Constitu- 
tion contemplated in this bill, I spoke of it as a necessity'' 
deeply to be deprecated; but as resulting from causes so 
certain and obvious, as to be absolutely inevitable, when the 
effect of the principle is practically experienced. It is to 
preserve, to guard the constitution of my country, that I 
denounce this attempt." — "The voice I have uttered, at 
which gentlemen startle with such agitation, is no unfriendly 
voice : I intend it as a voice of warning." f 

* Benton's AbriJgment of the Debates of Congress, vol. iv. p. 327. 

t His purpose and drift in this speech are made still more apparent from the follow- 
ing account of it, given at the time in a private letter to Mrs. Quincy: " I used strong 
language, because, by calling on the North to separate, I knew it would rouse the 
Southern men, who, though they are eternally throwing out threats of separation 
themselves, and thus govern the country with a rod of iron, yet tremble like aspen 
leaves at such a proposition coming from the North. I answered my purpose fully. 
The House were so arrested by my boldness, that they heard me throughout; and Poin- 
dexter has made ray position so prominent, that I have no doubt the nation will do the 



22 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

Precisely what he meant by releasing the old States from 
" their moral obligations " to the Union, is not clear. If he 
merely meant, that persistence in an open and avowed viola- 
tion of the original terms of the compact on the part of the 
Government would render that compact morally null and 
void, the doctrine is incontes'table. But, if the alleged viola- 
tion here complained of was really open and avowed, that is 
to say, acknowledged to be a violation on all sides, why go 
into an elaborate argument, as he does, to prove what no- 
body denied?* On the other hand, if the violation was 
asserted by one party, and denied by the other, — this being 
one of the principal questions at issue, as the debate shows, 
— it certainly was not competent for any State, as such, 
to decide the question for itself, and act accordingly. At 
the same time it is proper to observe, that Mr. Quincy's 
doctrine, however construed or judged, differs essentially, 
both in nature and extent, from that out of which the great 
Southern secession arose ; the latter being, that any State, by 
virtue of its sovereignty alone, has a right to secede from 
the Union for any cause deemed sufficient by itself, no matter 
whether the Constitution has been violated or not. 



same. If people in our part of the Union are tame on this question, which I deem 
both in principle and consequences the most important ever debated, they deserve to 
be, what they will be, slaves, and to no desirable masters." 

* Mr. Jefferson, as a "strict constructionist," had, it is true, entertained scruples 
on this subject at the time of the original purchase of Louisiana; but they were not 
shared, certainly not to the same extent, by his party in Congress, — not even by 
the Southern members. In this very debate, Mr. Macon, of North Carolina, admitted 
that the constitutional objection, if well-founded, ought to prevail; and this, too, not- 
withstanding any stipulations in the treaty of cession to the contrary. " It is never too 
late," said he, ''to return to the Constitution." Mr. Jefferson himself was induced at 
length to acquiesce, consistently or inconsistently, in a more liberal interpretation of 
that instrument on the point in question, — an interpretation, we may add, which has 
since been acted on repeatedly without much opposition, though it has never come up 
for adjudication in the Supreme Court. " At the present day," says Judge Story, " few 
statesmen are to be found who seriously contest the constitutionality of the Acts 
respecting either the Embargo, or the purchase and admission of Louisiana into the 
Union. The general voice of the nation has sustained and supported them." (Com- 
mentaries on the Constitution, vol. iii. p. 163.) — Perhaps such questions should be 
regarded as political rather than as juridical. 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 23 

But it was not in debate alone that Mr. Quincy evinced his 
zeal to serve his constituents. The representative of a large 
commercial district like Boston, besides his proper official 
charge in Congress, is expected to mediate between indi- 
viduals and the Government in a multitude of difficulties and 
grievances incident to foreign traffic, and to keep a vigilant 
eye on the bearing of every new measure on their interests. 
This care, always onerous, was made doubly so at the time 
in question, by what has been called the anti-commercial 
policy of the Administration ; but Mr. Quincy, to whom work 
throughout life was not so much a duty as a passion, ne- 
glected nothing. A single instance will illustrate his vigor 
and promptness. The dominant party having come to the 
conclusion, in the spring of 1812, to declare war against 
Great Britain, had made up their minds to impose an embargo 
of sixt}^ days as a preliminary step : — 

" Mr. Calhoun, on the eve of reporting this bill, communicated the 
purpose to Mr. Quincy, as the representative of a commercial district, 
in order that there might be no pretence of a surprise. Mr. Quincy 
at once advised with Mr. Lloyd, one of the Massachusetts senators, 
and instantly dispatched a special messenger to Boston with the in- 
telligence. This courier accomplished the distance in what was then 
regarded as the incredibly short time of seventy-two hours. In conse- 
quence of this dispatch, great numbers of ships were loaded and sent to 
sea, neither the night nor the Sabbath interrupting the work of neces- 
sity, before the news arrived by the regular channels. Mr. Calhoun 
was not well pleased with this speedy advantage taken of his intelli- 
gence ; but, as there was no particular purpose of pleasing him in the 
matter, it was of the less consequence." * 

Mr. Quincy's fourth term of office as member of Congress 
expired in March, 1813. He had declined being considered 
a candidate for re-election, much to the regret of his political 
friends ; but he could not be turned from his purpose. One 

* Memoir in the New York Tribune. 



24 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

reason was, that he had become weary of leading the forlorn 
hope of Federalism in the national councils ; and the more so, 
as Federalism was beginning to be a house divided against 
itself. He was also influenced, in no small measure, by domes- 
tic considerations. For three winters he had taken his family 
with him to Washington ; but this course, as the family in- 
creased, was attended by difficulty and expense he was 
unwilling to incur. He was therefore under the necessity 
of being separated from his wife and children for a consider- 
able portion of every year ; a great sacrifice to a man of his 
tastes and habits, and one which he did not feel called upon 
to make any longer, especially as he now saw that the most 
strenuous opposition to democratic measures, in the existing 
state of parties, would be of no avail.* 

In thus withdrawing from Congress, at least until better 
times, it was no part of Mr. Quincy's plan to retire from 
public life. He was immediately elected by substantially the 
same constituency to his former place in the Senate of Massa- 
chusetts, and continued an active and influential member of 
that body for seven years, from 1813 to 1820. Here he acted 
with the majority, and took his full share of the responsibility 
in moulding and determining the policy of this State during 
the last war with England. 

Early in the June session of 1813, he was appointed chair- 
man of a Committee to consider the recent formation of " new 
States without the territorial limits of the United States." 
His report is a restatement of the doctrine advanced in his 
Congressional speeches on this subject, though under a some- 
what mitigated form. The measure is denounced, not as 



* The vexation and despondency which had ah-eady taken possession of some of 
the best minds in the Federal party, may be judged of by the following passage, taken 
from a letter of Fisher Ames to Mr. Quincy, while the latter was in Congress: "I de- 
clare to you, I fear Federalism will not only die, but all remembrance of it be lost. As 
a party, it is still good for every thing it ever was good for; that is to say, to cry ' fire ' 
and ' stop thief,' when Jacobinism attempts to burn and rob. It never had the power 
to put out the fire, or to seize the thief." — Works of Fisher Ames, vol. i. p. 391. 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 25 

justifying, but as " tending to tlie dissolution of the Con- 
federacy." 

A few days afterwards, it was proposed to the Senate to pass 
certain resolves, in commendation of the gallantry and good 
conduct of Captain Lawrence, in the capture of a British brig 
of war. Similar resolves had been passed by both branches 
of the Legislature, in favor of other naval commanders ; they 
had also been passed by the House, in this particular case, by 
a unanimous vote. In the Senate, however, they were now 
met by the famous preamble and resolution submitted by Mr. 
Quincy, declaring among other things, " that in a war like the 
present, waged without justifiable cause and prosecuted in a 
manner which indicates that conquest and ambition are its 
real motives, it is not becoming a moral and religious people 
to express any approbation of military or naval exploits which 
are not immediately connected with the defence of the coast 
and the soil." The passage of this resolution was regarded 
at the time as a triumph of the " conscientious Federalists," 
so called ; it never had the approval of many of the leading 
members of the party, especially among the Boston mer- 
chants, who doubted the wisdom of speaking in this way of 
the victories achieved by our arms, and who were also con- 
cerned about their own interests, and fond of making a dis- 
tinction in favor of the navy over the land forces. In the 
Democratic journals, it was everywhere fiercely denounced 
as " moral treason." 

The unequal burdens and hardships imposed on New Eng- 
land by the Embargo, and afterwards by the war, continued 
to bear more and more heavily on the people, and produced a 
wide-spread spirit of discontent. This effect was still further 
aggravated by a suspicion, well or ill founded, that the South 
and West were in a conspiracy to cripple and destroy com- 
merce, on which New England mainly depended for its wealth 
and prosperity, and to introduce Mr. Jefferson's " Chinese " 
policy. Under these circumstances the Hartford Convention 

4 



26 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

assembled, in 1814; not (as we believe is now generally 
conceded) to increase or give effect to the disaff'ection, but 
to control it and keep it within constitutional limits. Mr. 
Quincy's relations to the whole movement are thus indicated 
by his son : — 

" When the Legislature of Massachusetts came to ai^point delegates, 
they omitted to elect Mr. Quincy. They were afraid to trust his im- 
petuous temperament and fiery earnestness. They thought that he 
would represent too well the spii-it of those who demanded the Con- 
vention. He always described the Convention as ' a Tub to the 
Whale,' as a dilatory measure to amuse the malcontents and make them 
believe that something was doing for their relief, and keep them quiet 
under inaction, until events might make action necessary. And this 
did actually happen. One day, while the public attention was fixed 
upon the Convention, then sitting with closed doors, a friend met Mr. 
Quincy in the street, and said, ' What do you suppose will be the 
result of this Convention ? ' — 'I can tell you exactly,' he replied. 
' Indeed,' exclaimed the other ; ' pray what will it be ? ' — 'A great 
PAMPHLET,' was his answer ; and it was even so." 

But it would be doing great injustice to Mr. Quincy to 
suppose, that his thoughts, as a legislator, were wholly or 
mainly occupied on questions of party politics. He was 
ever ready with his earnest and effective support of well- 
considered schemes for reform in prison discipline and in the 
poor-laws, for the relief of insolvent debtors, for the encour- 
agement of agriculture and popular education, and, in short, 
for all philanthropic measures. Indeed, it was his independ- 
ent course in respect to some of these measures, as well as the 
stand he took in 1819, with a small minority composed mostly 
of Democrats, against the separation of the District of Maine,* 

* The first bill passed by the Legislature on this subject, in 1816, was not accepted 
by the people of Maine. When the second, which really went into ef!'ect, was under 
consideration, in 1819, Mr. Quincy resisted it strenuously in an eloquent and character- 
istic speecli of two hours, in which he says: "Three years since, wlien a bill containing 
similar provisions to that which is now on the table was passed, it was my misfortune 
to be compelled to give it at this Board my solitary negative." He still stood alone in 
the Committee, a circumstance which he thus notices: "I call this situation of mine a 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 27 

which had the effect seriously to compromise his popularity 
with the managers of his own party. The consequence was> 
that, in making up the ticket for senators, in 1820, his name 
was dropped,* His personal and many of his political friends 
were offended at this step ; and, being determined that the 
public should not lose his services, they succeeded in getting 
him elected to the House. Soon after taking his seat in that 
body, Mr. Mills, the Speaker, resigned, and he was called to 
the chair, — a place which he continued to hold until January, 
1822, when he also resigned, in order to accept the appoint- 
ment of Judge of the Municipal Court, in Boston. 

Mr. Quincy's political life may be said to have now closed. 
This is the less to be regretted, inasmuch as the Federal 
party, the only party to which he ever properly belonged, 
was fast breaking up. The Federalists had never entirely 



misfortune; for, if I know myself, I am not ambitious of that sort of distinction which 
arises from mere singularity, either in conduct or opinion. I have accordingly, and 
sedulously too, endeavored to raise a doubt upon this question; but I cannot. I could 
as well doubt of my own existence as doubt of the unconstitutionality of this bill. 
And, on an occasion of such magnitude and solemnity, he who cannot doubt, cannot 
compromise." When the final question was taken in the Senate, the votes were, — 
j'eas, 26; nays, 11. 

* A communication to the "Boston Daily Advertiser" for April 18, 1820, under- 
stood to be from Mr. John Lowell, throws light on this transaction. "Why," the writer 
asks, " are the county of Suffolk and the State deprived of the experience and talents of 
Mr. Quincy? To him the result will probably be beneficial, since it has given him an 
opportunity, most honorable to his character, of showing his magnanimity and disin- 
terestedness. I would rather enjoy the triumph which that gentleman won at the late 
Federal caucus, than to have the unanimous suffrages of a fickle and ungrateful party. 
No: I will not say partij, because I believe that at least three-quarters of the Federal 
party, left to their unbiassed suffrages, not alarmed by reports that Mr. Quincy would 
not be supported, and that, of course, their exertions to secure his election would be in 
vain, would have given them their unqualified and zealous support. The fault I find 
with this issue is, that it seems to hold out to the world an opinion that something 
more than uncorrupted integrity, unquestionable purity of manners and character, 
cultivated understanding, long experience in public affairs, and an ardent zeal to pro- 
mote the honor and interests of the country, and the cause of religion and science, is 
expected of our rulers. And what is this something more that we expect? Is it a 
time-serving spirit and flattering manners? Is it dereliction of principle to preserve 
one's popularity? I repeat it, I would rather be Josiah Quincy, urging in a private 
assembly his fellow-citizens to do their duty, and to unite in favor of a list from which 
his own name was ungratefully excluded, than to have had the unanimous applause of 
both parties." 



28 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

recovered from their misunderstanding with John Adams, 
and still less from the defection of his son; but the actual 
dissolution of the party, at least as a national one, is com- 
monly dated from the so-called " era of good feelings," in- 
troduced at the inauguration of President Monroe, in 1817. 
So rapid and complete was this dissolution, that, on the recon- 
struction of parties at the election of John Quincy Adams to 
the Presidency, in 1824, nothing was left of Federalism, — not 
even the name. Few if any instances are on record of a 
party of equal merit and renown passing away so suddenly 
and so entirely. It has been succeeded in Massachusetts by 
parties of various denominations, some of which must have 
found difficulty in telling what they were; but all knew what 
they were not, — they were not Federalists. To the last, 
however, Mr. Quincy was " faithful found among the faith- 
less;" yet with a clear understanding that the old party could 
never be revived. In reply to a letter written to him in 
1847, on the subject of a "History of Federalism," he says: — 

" It is not, however, to be concealed, that there is now no such thing 
possible as the retin-n of such influences. The circumstances of our 
country no longer permit any such purity of motives, as characterized 
the Federal policy, to be either a general or an efficient principle of 
party action. The Federal leaders had a clear stage. They were not 
embarrassed by precedents or examples. They had a homogeneous 
population to guide, not a composite of all nations and languages. They 
had for the basis of their power the character and influences of Wash- 
ington, whose virtues, tried through the War of the Kevohitiou, gave a 
weight and secured a popularity for their measures, which no future 
combination of men can hope to attain or possess. . . . The princi- 
ples of Federalism lasted in power but twelve years, and in purity can 
never be restored to it. Ojyposuit Natura." 

Seventeen of the best years of Mr. Quincy's life had been 
given to legislation and statesmanship. Before passing to 
other topics, it may be well to consider how far his political 
theories have been confirmed by events. 



MEMOIE OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 29 

These theories, as entertained at that time, are Lest ex- 
pressed in his " Oration before the Washington Benevolent 
Society," delivered by him in 1813, soon after his retirement 
from Congress. According to him, the principal danger to 
be apprehended in this country was from the disturbance of 
" the proportions of political power," occasioned '' partly by 
the operation of the slave-ratio in the Constitution, and partly 
by the unexampled emigration into the West." As a natural 
consequence, the preponderance of the old States would be 
gradually transferred to the new; and, what is worse, a new 
national policy would be established favorable to the agricul- 
tural States, and adverse to the commercial States. New 
England must, perhaps, submit to this up to a certain point, 
as '' the fair result of the compact.'^ 

" We had agreed," says he, " that all the people within the ancient 
limits of the United States shonld be placed on the same footing, and 
had granted an undoubted right to Congress to admit States at will, 
within the ancient li?7iits. We had done more ; we had submitted to 
throw our rights and liberties, and those of our children, into a com- 
mon stock with the Southern men and their slaves, and had agreed 
to be content with what remained after they and their negroes were 
served." 

But the admission of Louisiana into the Union, deemed by 
him clearly unconstitutional, had put a new face on the whole 
transaction. Our allegiance to " a certain extrinsic associa- 
tion called the United States " is limited by the condition, 
that " the principles of the Constitution should be preserved 
inviolate." — " Whether any such violation has occurred, or 
whether it be such as essentially affects the securities of their 
rights and liberties, are questions which the people of the 
associated States are competent, not only to discuss, but io 
decided His conclusion is, that " the people of this country 
have but two events between which to select, and that at no 
distant period of time: either to put an end to this oppres- 
sion, and the chance of its recurrence, by a new and amicable 



30 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

modification of the proportions and powers of the Constitu- 
tion ; or to worry along a httle farther, until the weight of 
grievances produce convulsions which will put an end to the 
Constitution." * 

Time has sanctioned some of these speculations, and set 
aside others. He was certainly among the first to see, in all 
its extent, the danger to be apprehended from the slavehold- 
ing power. Occupied almost exclusively with the political 
aspects of slavery, there was no man in those early days so 
profoundly impressed by the conviction, that out of that in- 
stitution would grow jealousies and contentions which would 
shake the Union to its foundations. So far, he is to be reck- 
oned among the prophets. But in other respects his fore- 
bodings, or man}' of them at least, though shared by some 
of the best and wisest men of his party, have not been 
fulfilled. New England, by adding manufactures to com- 
merce, and bringing to both the exhaustless resources of free 
and skilled labor, has never ceased to prosper under the 
Constitution as it was, and as it is. Again, he did not make 
sufficient account of the many ties of interest and sympathy 



* There can be no doubt that the views here advanced were generally entertained 
by the party, not excepting its Southern members. Alexander C. Hanson, of Bal- 
timore, wrote: "Yon mistake the feelings and wishes of the Federalists with whom 
I communicate, if you suppose the language ol your oration too strong, or your sug- 
gestions offensive. Our only fear was, that the leading men of Massachusetts would 
lack boldness. We groan and sweat under domestic tyranny, as mnch as our brethren 
in the New-England States; we turn an anxious eye on your proceedings, and receive 
your speech as a pledge of actions suitable to such language. Our only chance for 
relief and salvation depends on the vigor and intrepidity of the New-England States. 
There is a short and sui'e road to relief; and, sooner or later, it must be taken. The 
South and West will continue to govern us as long as the North and East are willing 
to be governed." 

What John Randolph, who belonged to no party, thought of this oration, is thus 
expressed to one of his correspondi-nts: "Mr. Quincy sent me a copy of his speech of 
the 30th of last month. It is a composition of much ability and depth of thought; 
but it indicates a spirit and a temper to the North which is more a subject of regret 
than of surprise. The grievances of Lord North's administration were but a feather in 
the scale, when compared with those inflicted by Jefferson and Madison." (Garland's 
" Life of John Randolph.") — Mr. Quincy is said to have been almost the only Iriend of 
Randolph with whom he never quarrelled. 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 31 

between the free Atlantic States and the free inland States, 
new as well as old, which, in a great national struggle, were 
almost sure to enlist them on the same side. Neither cOuld 
he foresee that vast network of railroad communication which 
is now doing so much to bind together the East and the West, 
and secure the prosperity of both. 

Moreover, the theory of the Constitution advanced by him 
in Congress, and re-affirmed, as we understand it, in this ora- 
tion, is not that which is now generally held, at least by loyal 
men. How can any State or section of States proceed " to 
discuss and decide " the perilous question, whether the Con- 
stitution has been violated, or not, without usurping the 
authority which that very Constitution has expressly dele- 
gated to the Supreme Court? So that, even if the Constitu- 
tion were to be regarded as a simple and ordinary "compact," 
dependent for its obligation on the continued fulfilment of all 
its conditions, the right contended for could not be sustained. 
In point of fact, however, according to the highest authority 
on this subject, the Constitution, in strictness of language, is 
not a compact at all, but a government founded on a compact, — 
a government thenceforth resting on its own power to enforce 
its own will. " When the people agree to erect a govern- 
ment, and actually erect it, the thing is done, and the agree- 
ment is at an end. The compact is executed, and the end 
designed by it attained."* On this doctrine, and, as it would 
seem, on this doctrine alone, can a coerced Union, or a Union 
restored by force, be reconciled with republican principles or 
the right of self-government. 

At the same time, the enlightened and candid historian, in 
pronouncing judgment on the positions taken by the Federal- 
ists at the period now under consideration, will make large 
allowance for the difference between the circumstances under 



* Mr. Webster's Speech in the Senate of the United States, Feb. 16, 1833, in oppo- 
sition to the resolutions submitted by Mr. Calhoun. 



32 MEMOIE OF JOSIAH QUINCY. • 

which they lived and thought, and those under which we live 
and think. It has been said of Tycho Brahe, that, with the 
evidence as it then stood, he was right in maintaining his false 
theory of the heavens against the true one of Copernicus. 
A similar remark is applicable to the leaders of Federalism 
at the time of which we are now speaking. The evidence, as 
it then stood, was often on their side, when the truth was not. 
Even in those respects in which their apprehensions or their 
policy have been overruled and set aside by experience, it 
has been by the experience which followed, and not by that 
which went before. Accordingly, it may be said, that, when 
the old Federalists were wrong and the old Democrats right, 
it was, in many cases at least, because the former looked to 
reason and precedent, while the latter trusted in their feel- 
ings and instincts. How, indeed, was it possible for men 
acting year after year in a hopeless and continually decreas- 
ing minority, every new measure of public importance seem- 
ing to them a downward step, their imaginations haunted, 
meanwhile, by the excesses and issues of the French Revolu- 
tion, — how was it possible for such men, so circumstanced, 
not to lose more or less of their confidence in the stability of 
the existing Government, and in the popular will? Happily, 
however, Mr. Quincy lived to have his faith in both abundantly 
restored, and to see and acknowledge, even in those events 
which most perplexed him at the time, the hand of God. 

The appointment of Mr. Quincy to the bench of the Muni- 
cipal Court, in 1822, after he had been withdrawn from the 
practice of his profession for nearly twenty years, occasioned 
some surprise. But without much reason ; for the jurisdic- 
tion of this court was exclusively criminal, and he was known 
never to have remitted his attention to the best means of 
dealing with the suffering and dangerous classes, or to the 
changes made or contemplated in the criminal law. 

He retained this place but little more than a year; yet 
one of his decisions lias permanently connected his name with 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 33 

the history of Law Reform. It was in the action against Mr. 
Buckingham, editor of the " New-England Gakixy," for a Hbel 
on J. N. Maflfitt, a noted preacher of tliat day, which came np 
for trial in the December Term of 1822. The prosecuting offi- 
cer in this case had agreed to waive an advantage understood 
to be given him by the law as it then was, and to allow the 
defendant to prove the truth in evidence. But the Judge 
objected to this course, on the ground that, if the law of 
Massachusetts really and purposely excluded such testimony, 
the Court was not at liberty to permit its introduction merely 
on the plea of an agreement of parties. He then went into 
a full discussion of the legal point at issue, undertaking to 
deduce, from the Constitutional guaranty of a free press in 
this Commonwealth, that every one here has the right to 
publish the truth from good motives ; and hence the admissi- 
bility of the truth in evidence in all cases of prosecution for 
libel, — not, indeed, as being a justification in all cases, but as 
bearing essentially on the question of motive or intent to be 
decided by the jury. 

Objections were made at the time to both the substance 
and form of this ruling of the Judge ; and it does not appear 
to have been generally accepted as law.* In the very same 
court, when Mr. Buckingham was arraigned before it again 
for Hbel, in 1824, he was not allowed to prove the truth of 



* The decision was not only commented on in the newspapers, but called forth two 
considerable pamphlets. The first was " A Letter to the Hon. Josiah Quincy, Judge of 
the Municipal Court in the City of Boston, on the Law of Libel, as laid down by him 
in the Case of Commonwealth v. Buckingham. By a IMember of the Suffolk Bar." 
It contests many of his positions, taking substantially the old "common-law" ground, 
that the sole object of public prosecutions for libel is to prevent breaches of the peace; 
and that, viewed in this light, the truth or falsehood of the statement is immaterial, — 
nay, that the truth of the statement often aggravates the evil. It was soon followed by 
" Reflections upon the Law of Libel, in a Letter addressed to a Member of the Suffolk 
Bar. By a Citizen; " in which the other side is argued with ability and discrimination, 
and the personalities in the" Letter" are successfully and indignantly repelled. Both 
of the pamphlets were published anonymously, the author of the "Letter" not being 
known or suspected at the time by the author of the " Reflections." Afterwards, it was 
under stood that the former was Harrison Gray Otis, jun., and the latter, Edmund 
Kimball, then j'oung lawyers in Boston. 

5 



34 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

the publication, though it was asked for expressly, not as a 
justification, but to rebut the cliarge of" malice. Still we are 
not to suppose that Mr. Quincy's courageous defence of a free 
press was without effect. There is every reason to believe, 
that his forcible statement of what the law ought to he, to- 
gether with the discussion to which it gave rise, had great 
weight in determining the Legislature of Massachusetts to 
pass an Act in 1827, granting, in express terms, to the defend- 
ant in prosecutions for libel, the very right which he had 
contended for on the ground of the common law controlled 
by the Constitution of the State. However this may be, it is 
certain that a law of libel, substantially the same with that 
laid down by Judge Quincy, has since been adopted in every 
State in the Union, either by statute, or by express provision 
of the Constitution. And the same is also true of England; 
in short, wherever the press is unshackled, that is to say, 
wherever men are allowed to publish the truth^ with good 
motives and for justifiable ends, whether in respect to "public 
characters " or private citizens. 

After serving his native city for fifteen months on the 
bench, Mr. Quincy accepted the more difficult and responsible 
office of its chief magistrate, which he held nearly six years. 
Boston owes much to the circumstance, that its most distin- 
guished citizens, men born and brought up there, and for this 
reason feeling a natural and just pride in its institutions and 
good name, have always been willing to take an active part 
in municipal affairs. The Revolutionary renown associated 
with the old town organization and the old name, together 
with a strong democratic fondness for transacting public busi- 
ness in popular assemblies, induced the inhabitants to reject 
several attempts to introduce a city government from as far 
back as 1784. At length, however, in 1821, the population 
had grown to be so large as to make the old system manifestly 
inadequate ; and a city charter was therefore obtained and 
finally adopted, though not without strenuous resistance in 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 35 

which Mr. Quincy participated to some extent.* Still, not- 
withstanding this opposition, when the canvass was opened 
for the first Mayor, he was put forward as a prominent candi- 
date, and actually received the largest number of votes at the 
first trial. But no choice being made, and serious political 
misunderstandings having arisen, he immediately withdrew 
his name, as did also the other candidates; f and at the next 
trial Mr. John Phillips was elected by a union of all parties. 
Mr. Phillips retired at the end of the year, and was suc- 
ceeded by Mr. Quincy, who was inducted into office with 
the usual forms, May 1, 1823. 

In the short administration of his predecessor, little had 
been attempted, except to organize the new form of govern- 
ment, and put it in working order. All the great reforms 
so confidently anticipated from the change were still to be 
effected ; a work which could not have fallen into more faith- 
ful and resolute hands. 

One of Mr. Quincj^'s first objects was to carry into full 
effect a scheme commenced two years before, by a committee 
appointed by the town, of which ho was chairman. Even at 



* Mr. Quincy is said, in the Memoir by his son, to have "stronglv opposed this 
change, thinking that the old system of town government was the best adapted to the 
habits and wants of the citizens, and the least liable to abuses." Also, when he was 
first nominated for Maj-or, it was objected, that he had been " t!ie most zealous and 
active opponent of the city charter." That he was opposed to some parts of the new 
scheme and of the proposed charter, there can be no doubt; but that tie wished to 
retain "the old system," is hardly consistent with what he says in his "Municipal 
History of Boston." He there tells us (p. 28), that " the impracticability of conduct- 
ing the municipal interests of the place under the form of Town Government" had 
become " apparent to the inhabitants." With seven thousand qualified voters convened 
in town-meeting, it was, as he goes on to show, " evidently impossible calmly to de- 
liberate and act;" and, in consequence, "a few busy or interested individuals easily 
obtained the management of the most important affairs." 

t The other candidates were the Hon. Harrison Gray Otis, and the Hon. Thomas 
L. Winthrop. The following is Mr. Quincy's account of this political imbroglio: " When 
I promised a body of my fellow-citizens to stand, Otis was not in the field; he was a 
member of the United-States Senate, and his intention to run for the mayoralty was un- 
known to me. When informed he was a candidate, I solicited the Committee to whom 
my promise had been made to release me from it, as I had no wish to run against 
Mr. Otis; but they refused." 



36 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUIXCY. 

that time, the abuses connected with the almshouse in Lev- 
erett Street had aroused pubhc attention to the necessity of! 
some change in the care of the poor, and of making some 
distinction between the virtuous and the vicious poor. In 
pursuance of this end, the committee just mentioned had al- 
ready purchased above sixty acres of land in South Boston, 
and erected upon it a House of Industry ; in order that the 
able-bodied among its inmates miglit find, in cultivating the 
ground, what was believed to be the most healthful, and at 
the same time the most profitable, employment. But the 
whole plan was in danger of being frustrated by a multitude 
of obstacles, growing partly out of lingering prejudices against 
the workhouse system, and partly out of the jealousy of offi- 
cials and the disputed jurisdiction of rival Boards, which it 
required all Mr. Quincy's courage and determination to over- 
come. Even with his utmost exertions, it was not until April, 
1825, that the last occupants of tlie almshouse were trans- 
ferred to South Boston. Meanwhile, a House of Correction 
had been built there under the same auspices ; and this was 
soon followed by the House of Reformation for Juvenile 
Offenders. There can be no doubt, that a large and growing 
city would have found it necessary sooner or later to make 
these or similar provisions. Still, it is to the credit of Mr. 
Quincy that he hastened the measure, and by hastening it 
was able to secure an eligible location for the experiment in 
the neighborhood, before the opportunity was for ever lost.* 
His attention was next called to the sanitary and police 
regulations, which, from the remissness or timidity of the 
authorities, had not kept pace with the growth of the city. 
No part of the present arrangement for securing cleanliness, 
comfort, and health, which is the just pride of the citizens, 



* For the sixty-three acres, which constituted at first the City Farm in South Bos- 
ton, only one hundred dollars an acre were given, though, before the signing of the 
deed, five hundred dollars were oftered the original proprietor. Land in that vicinity 
soon afterwards rose to one thousand dollars an acre. 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 37 

was then in operation. For introducing it, they are mainly 
indebted to Mr. Quincy ; and some notion of the extent of 
the reform may be gathered from the fact, that, under tlie 
new system, more than three thousand tons of dirt and decay- 
ing substances of every kind, accumulated on the wharves 
and in the narrow streets and alleys, were removed in a sin- 
gle month. "For the first time, on any general scale destined 
for universal application, the broom was used upon the streets. 
On seeing this novel spectacle of files of sweepers, an old 
and common adage was often applied to the new administra- 
tion of city affairs ; in good humor by some, in a sarcastic 
spirit by others." * 

Nor were his measures less prompt and decisive for sup- 
pressing social and moral nuisances ; one instance of which 
will suffice to illustrate the character of the new regime. By 
a strange anomalj^, in one of the most orderly and decorous 
cities in the world, another Alsatia, on a small scale, had been 
suffered to grow up in a part of what was then called West 
Boston, where the law, and the officers appointed to enforce 
it, were openly set at defiance. 

" Twelve or fourteen houses of infamous character were openly 
kept, without concealment and without shame. The chief officer of tlie 
former police said to tlie Mayor, soon after liis inauguration, ' There 
are dances there almost every night. The whole street is in a blaze 
of light from their windows. To put tliem down without a military 
force seems impossible : a man's life would not be safe who should 
attempt it. The company consists of highbinders, jail-birds, known 
thieves and miscreants, with women of the worst description. Mur- 
ders, it is well known, have been committed there, and more have been 



* Quincy's " Municipal Historj- of Boston," p. 68. The bills of mortality afford a 
striking proof of the wisdom and effectiveness of these sanitary measures. For tlie ten 
years which preceded Mr. Quincy's accession to the mayoralty, in 1823, tlie annual 
average proportion of deaths to the population in Boston was about one to forty-two; 
during the next four years, it was less than one to fifty; and in the last three years of 
hisad ministration, ending with 1828, it was but one to fifty-seven. — Ibid, p. 267. It 
is understood, that the usual average of mortality in cities of equal population was at 
that time about one to forty-seven. 



38 MEMOIR OP JOSIAH QUINCY. 

suspected.' He was asked, ' if vice and villany were too strong for 
the police.' He replied, ' I tlii-nk so ; at least, it has long been so in 
that quarter.' He was answered, ' Tliere shall be at least a struggle 
for the supremacy of the laws.' " * 

In such a struggle, resolutel}^ undertaken by Mr. Quincj, 
there could be no doubt about the issue. The whole district 
was put under ban ; all licenses were revoked ; a vigorous 
police Avas organized ; and, before the expiration of Mr, Quin- 
cy's first official term, that section of the city was as quiet 
and safe as any other.f 

But the most enduring monument of his services as Mayor 
is the Market-house which bears his name. At first, nothing 
more was contemplated than to extend the accommodations 
ab-eady afforded in the basement of Faneuil Hall. Even this, 
liowever, when brought up for consideration before a meeting 
of tlie citizens, was scouted by many as a wasteful extrava- 
gance, as *' the mammoth project of the Mayor." But the 
scheme gradually expanded, until it embraced the opening of 
six new streets, and the erection of one of the finest and best 
appointed market-houses in the world. From beginning to 
end, Mr. Quincy was the soul of the enterprise; never dis- 
couraged, indefatigable, freely incurring personal responsi- 
bilit}^ when it was necessary to further the object. It was, 
therefore, with no ordinary satisfaction that he was able to 



* Ibid., p. 102. 

t Mr. Quincy had been led thoroughly to investigate the great questions connected 
•with pauperism and crime, and indeed with the -whole subject of social evils and 
abuses, before being called upon to carry his principles into effect. This appears from 
the "Address of the Board of Trustees of the Massachusetts General Hospital," written 
by him in 1814; his " Report to the Legislature on the Pauper Laws of Massachusetts," 
in 1821 ; his " Keports on the subject of Pauperism and a House of Industry in the Town 
of Boston," in the same year ; and his " Remarks on some of the Provisions of tlie Laws 
of Massachusetts affecting Poverty, Vice, and Crime," in 1822. These, for the time, 
are full and instructive papers. In fact, when we remember how much Mr. Quincy 
wrote and did at that early daj' for the public health and comfort, and to prevent or 
repress mendicity and crime, especially among the young, and what opposition he met 
with and overcame, it seems to us that he is better entitled than any other person to 
be called the Father of Social Science in this country, — a science now in such vogue. 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 39 

say, in his final Report on the subject, Nov. 13th, 1826, that 
the noble improvement was completed ; and this, too, without 
any addition to the taxes or pecuniary burdens of the city, 
present or to come. 

If this were the place for a full account of Mr. Quincy's 
mayoralty, it would be proper to speak of other things : es- 
pecially of his efforts to extend the advantages of the public 
scliools ; of his reconstruction of the fire department, then 
for the first time made an independent and responsible body ; 
of his care to recover for the city an exclusive title to the 
''Ropewalk Lands," west of Charles Street, now the Public 
Garden ; of the measures taken by him to defend the islands 
in the harbor against the inroads of the sea ; and of the first 
movements towards supplying the city with water."^'" It is 
not meant that every thing done under Mr. Quincy's admin- 
istration was done by him : on the contrary, he is eager, on 
several occasions, to acknowledge important aid from other 
members of the city government. Still he was the chief 
administrative and executive officer, and not a man to be so 
in name without being so in realit3\ Accordingly, it is im- 
possible to review his course as Mayor without being con- 
vinced, that, owing partly to the time and circumstances in 
which he entered on the office, and partly to his personal 
qualities, the city, in its municipal capacity, is under more 
and greater obligations to him, than to any other individual. 

Nevertheless, he was aware from the outset, that a faith- 
ful and uncompromising discharge of the duties of the chief 
magistracy would give offence, not only to individuals, but 
to whole classes. In his first Inaugural Address, he intimated 
that an amount of discontent would thus be gradually ac- 
cumulated, which must sooner or later exclude him from 
office. And so it proved. Twice he was re-elected, almost 



* The first surveys and estimates for supplying Boston with water by aqueduct 
■were made by Professor Treaclwell, at the request of Mr. Quincy, in 1825. 



40 MEMOIE OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

unanimously ; but, after that, an organized and growing oppo- 
sition began to manifest its.e]f, which was at length successful. 
Wiien a candidate for the sixth time, in December, 1828, he 
still had a decided plurality of the votes; but, after failing 
on two trials to obtain the requisite majority, he definitively 
withdrew. Mr. Quincy's own account of the whole affair, as 
given in his " Address on Taking Final Leave of the Office of 
Mayor," is characteristic. 

" In all this there is nothing uncommon or unprecedented. The 
public officer who, from a sense of public duty, dares to cross strong 
interests in their way to gratification at the public expense, always has 
had, and ever will have, meted to him the same measure. The beaten 
course is, first to slander in order to intimidate ; and, if that fail, then 
to slander in order to sacrifice. He who loves his ofiice better than 
his duty, will yield and be flattered, — as long as he is a tool. He 
who loves his duty better than his ofiice will stand erect, — and take 
his fate." 

This is not the language of a demagogue, nor of a disap- 
pointed office-seeker; nor yet of an adroit politician: some, 
indeed, may think that a more conciliating manner might 
have saved his popularity, without involving any important 
sacrifice of principle. However this may be, it is certain 
that his most determined opponents never whispered against 
him the charge of official corruption, or of selfish or by 
ends ; much less that of negligence or inaction. On the con- 
trary, one of the principal complaints was, that he took too 
much on himself; that he placed himself at the head of all 
important Committees, and prepared all important Reports ; 
that there was no place which was not " vexed by his pres- 
ence." To give a single example : it was his custom to mount 
his horse at daybreak, and traverse the streets and lanes of 
the city, that he might see every thing with his own eyes. 
There were those, of course, to whom such incessant vigi- 
lance and activity were unwelcome ; and they revenged them- 
selves by calling it "officiousness " and " intermeddling." So 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 41 

far was this feeling carried, that, on one occasion, he was actu- 
ally arraigned before the Police Court for fast riding, when 
thus engaged in the public business, — to the danger, as it 
was said, of other passengers. Two witnesses testified to the 
fact. Mr. Quincy appeared, and pleaded " Not guilty," being 
sure that no risk whatever had been incurred; at the same 
time, he was willing that judgment should be entered against 
him, and the fine and costs imposed, " to show that no indi- 
vidual could be placed above the law." 

The only other popular topic insisted on against him was 
the City Debt. Of course, it was impossible to carry through 
the large public improvements instituted by him without large 
public expenditure. Still he considered his defence complete, 
inasmuch as he could say, that the taxes had not increased in 
a ratio equal to the actual increase of property and popula- 
tion. Nay, more : he triumphantly asks, " Have I not a right 
to assert, according to the usual and justifiable forms of ex- 
pression under circumstances of this kind, that, so far as 
respects the operations of the Administration now passing 
away, they have left the city incumbered with no debt ; 
because they have left it possessed of a newly-acquired real 
property, far greater, in marketable value, than the whole 
debt it has incurred?" For these reasons, in concluding his 
farewell Address, he did not hesitate to exclaim, in the noble 
language used by the Hebrew magistrate on a similar occa- 
sion, " Behold ! here I am: witness against me. Whom have 
I defrauded? whom have I oppressed? at whose hands have 
I received any bribe ? " 

Mr. Quincy was now fifty-seven years old. For most of 
the time since arriving at manhood, he had held, as we have 
seen, important civil trusts ; but this did not hinder him from 
taking an active part in the principal literary and scientific 
associations of the day, and in all well-concerted measures for 
the improvement of society, — a circumstance to be noticed 
here, because it doubtless had quite as much to do in prepar- 



42 MEMOIE OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

ing the way, and suggesting his fitness, for his next appoint- 
ment, as the public stations he had filled. 

He was an early member of the American Academy of 
Arts and Sciences, and of the Massachusetts Historical So- 
ciety. For many years he was a Trustee of Phillips Acad- 
emy in Andover, and of the Theological Institution engrafted 
on it, and an Overseer of Harvard University. His duties at 
Washington, as a Representative in Congress, prevented him 
*from being a member of the Anthology Club: but he was a 
zealous and libei-al promoter of the Boston Athenaeum, which 
grew out of that Club; and on leaving Congress, in 1813, he 
was made one of its Trustees. He was re-elected to this place, 
without intermission, for the next fifteen years ; and for the 
last nine of them, and until his removal to Cambridge, he 
was President of the Institution. He also belonged to the 
first Board of Trustees of the Massachusetts General Hos- 
pital, and wrote the Address to the Public, in 1814, which 
resulted in raising the necessary funds for that noble charity. 
In 1824, Harvard College conferred on him the honorary de- 
gree of Doctor of Laws. 

Nor should the military episode in Mr. Quincy's life be 
passed over in silence. It was in the disturbed times which 
preceded and attended our last war with England ; when all 
thoughtful men felt the necessity there was to strengthen 
the hands of the government against invasion or insurrection 
from whatever quarter it might come. Under these circum- 
stances, the Hussars, a troop of cavalry, splendidly mounted 
and equipped, was raised among the gentlemen of Boston and 
the vicinity in 1810, and Mr. Quincy was elected Captain. 
Afterwards he was promoted to the command of a squadron of 
horse, consisting of the Hussars and Dragoons, with the rank 
of Major. The Memoir, so often quoted, goes on to say, — 

" His great personal advantages of face and figure, set off by his 
superb uniform, and by his fine charger ' Bayard,' white as snow, still 
dwell in the memory of the older inhabitants of Boston as the finest 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 43 

sight of man and horse they ever saw. At the peace, this corps was 
disbanded, its expensiveness being extreme ; and he closed his military 
life. His horse ' Bayard,' oddly enough, was aftcrwai'ds exported to 
Hayti, and became the favorite charger of the black king Christophe." 

The ancestral estate in Quincy, bequeathed to him by his 
grandfatlier, came into his possession in 1798, and was ever 
afterwards, except while he was President of Harvard Col- 
lege, his summer residence. Here his attention was naturally- 
turned to scientific and experimental farming, which he en- 
tered into, especially after resigning his seat in Congress, 
with his accustomed enthusiasm ; his failures and successes, 
as is usual in such cases, being almost equally instructive 
to his neighbors and the public. He also became a leading 
member of the Massachusetts Agricultural Society, and con- 
tributed several valuable papers to the journal published un- 
der its auspices. Thus his year was about equally divided 
between his house in Boston and his house in Quincy, both 
of which were centres of a large and generous hospitality to 
his friends and to distinguished strangers. As his family- 
were with him in his first winters at Washington, he had no 
occasion for his house in Pearl Street, before mentioned, and 
it was therefore leased, and never returned to. Afterwards, 
his town residence was successively in Oliver Street on Fort 
Hill, in Summer Street, and in Hamilton Place, — the last 
during his Mayoralty, and until his removal to Cambridge. 

Dr. Kirkland had resigned the presidency of Harvard Col- 
lege in April, 1828. The place was still vacant at the end 
of the year, when, by the result of the election for Mayor in 
Boston, Mr. Quincy, as we have seen, was relieved from all 
public cares ; and the attention of the Corporation was imme- 
diately- turned on him as Dr. Kirkland's successor. He was 
chosen President of the University, January 15th, 1829. Up 
to this time, his mind had been mainly intent on political 
and civil affairs : for the sixteen years which followed, includ- 
ing all that remained of his public life, he threw himself, with 



44 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUI^X'Y. 

characteristic singleness and earnestness of purpose, into 
his newly appointed work. It was a great change ; and 
the feelings with which he contemplated it are best ex- 
pressed in the following answer, under date of January 
24th, to a very kind and cordial letter of welcome from 
the elder Dr. Ware : — 

" I need not say to you, Sir, liow little the contemplated station has 
been to me an object of ambition, or even of desire. Not that it does 
not in itself include sutiicient to render it a just object of the higbest 
ambition and purest desire ; but because, xintil it was proposed to me, it 
had never come within the scope of any thought or project of my life. 
" When it was presented to my option, it was contemplated solely 
in the light of duty ; and when my reflections resulted in a determina- 
tion to accept, in case the appointing and sanctioning Boards should 
concur, I am not conscious that self-interest threw any weight into the 
preponderating scale. On the contrary, I feel that I am about to make 
great sacrifices of personal comfort, and to engage in new duties at a 
great disadvantage, both from my period of life and my previous habits, 
— that the result is dubious, as it respects not only my happiness, but 
my reputation. 

" From all that I knew of the state of the interior of the Semi- 
nary, as well as from what I was apprized was seriously contemplated in 
this city, I could not but realize that the affairs of it were at a crisis, 
which made it the duty of every well-wisher to it to apply his strength 
in whatever way those intrusted with its superintendence deemed use- 
ful. Under the circumstances in which, by a singular course of Provi- 
dence, I found myself placed, I could not refrain from believing that so 
extraordinary and unexpected a proposition, made at such a moment, 
indicated an imperious and not to be questioned duty. 

" Throwing aside, therefore, personal considerations, and every other 
but this leading sense of obligation, I resolved, that, if called by the 
conjunct authorities of the University, I would undertake a task which 
I do not even yet know how it will be in my power to execute. 

" I beg you, Sir, to be assured, and request you to assure the other 
gentlemen of the Faculty, that, if events should call me to that station, 
I shall enter upon it, pursuing no theories, subject to no schemes, with 
no projects ; that I come free of pledge to change or to continue any 
thing that is done or in existence at the Seminary ; and with a cordial 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 45 

desire to harmonize with, as I honor, every member of that Board. 
An absolute self-devotion to the interests of the Seminary is all that I 
promise." 

The election of Mr. Quincy was confirmed by the Over- 
seers, January 29th, and he was inaugurated with the cus- 
tomary formalities on Tuesday, the 2d of June.* Until the 
induction of President Kirkland, in 1810, all the inaugural 
exercises excepting the prayers, had been in Latin. With 
him began the practice of delivering the Inaugural Dis- 
course in English ; but neither his nor Mr. Quincy's was 
printed. The latter contained a forcible statement of the 
importance of adapting the methods and processes of edu- 
cation to the wants of the people and the spirit of the 
age ; together with an earnest protest against an unreason- 
able urging of change, and the propensity in this country 
to multiply colleges, instead of building up and properly en- 
dowing a few. 

At the inauguration, as well as in the letter just quoted 
and on other occasions, he speaks of his surprise on being 
called to preside over the University, and at the total change 
it would require in his habits of life, and this, too, at a some- 
what advanced period of life. Nevertheless, it was a per- 
fectly natural appointment. Mr. Quincy had always been a 
favorite and honored son of the University, and had stood up 
for her courageously, on more than one occasion, wdien her 
rights were threatened. He had also kept up his scholarly, 
and especially his classical, tastes and studies throughout all 
the vicissitudes of his public career, and, by his published 



* The votes of the Overseers were forty for concurring, and twenty-six against it. 
The opposition was made up partly of those who objected to him on political or secta- 
rian grounds, and partly of tliose who thought that the President of the College sliould 
be a clergyman, as had been the usage hitherto, with the single exception of Judpe 
Leverett, and he was a Bachelor of Divinity, and had preached for a siiort period. Tlie 
confirmation was strenuously resisted by writers in the " Boston Recorder " and the 
" Boston Statesman." 



46 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

speeches, orations, addresses, and reports, and his contribu- 
tions to the newspapers and magazines,* had won an acknowl- 
edged place among the literary men of the country. Nor 
should we forget in this connection the " Memoir" of his fother, 
which he had given to the world in 1825, and of which Mr. 
Webster said, " It is one of the most interesting books I ever 
read, and brings me nearer than any other to the spirit which 
caused the American Revolution.'' Above all, he had a dis- 
tinguished name and large connections and influence, and 
was known to be a man of experience and skill in affairs, of 
untiring assiduity, and of great vigor in government, — quali- 
ties in which the College was then supposed to be especially 
in want. A writer in the '^ Boston Statesman," though op- 
posed to the ap23ointment on sectarian grounds, felt obliged 
to say, "For Mr. Quincy I have a very high regard; and I 
think him possessed, in a high degree, of some of the qualifi- 
cations for" the chief executive office in the University. I 
utterly disclaim any design, in the remarks I am about to 
make, of calling in question his personal or literary qualifica- 



* Newspaper " editorials," as they are now termed, were almost unknown in Mr. 
Quincy's early days, their place being supplied by articles, or series of articles, con- 
tributed anonymouslj', or under some popular pseudonj'm, by the leading and active 
minds of the day. Mr. Quincy did his full share of this work; but it is no longer easy 
to identify his contributions. The " Port Folio," in Philadelphia, was edited by his 
classmate, Joseph Dennie; and on this account, as well as from sympathy with its high 
political tone, he is supposed to have been a not unfrequent contributor to it. A long 
series of papers, headed " Climenole," and running through almost the whole of the 
fourth volume, for 1804, is ascribed to his pen. It is an ironical satire on the Democratic 
party, which probably had an interest and significance at the time, now lost. He also 
wrote occasionally for the " Monthly Anthology." He is the author of an extended and 
elaborate Review of Fisher Ames's Works, begun in the number for November, 1809, and 
continued through several successive numbers. Of course the article is highlj' laudatoiy : 
it could not be otherwise, in speaking of one of the greatest and best men this country 
has produced. But it is also discriminating, and shows a consciousness of the weak side 
of many of the Federal attacks on the dominant party. " He was," says the reviewer, 
" a partizan warrior, perpetually dashing into the very centre of the hostile camp, dis- 
turbing the sleep of the commander, and depriving his guards of repose; but the result 
of his efforts was rather brilliant than decisive. He brought away more marks of honor 
than trophies of victory; and obtained more evidences than rewards of prowess. His 
virtues and skill were the delight and admiration of his friends; but it does not appear 
that he made any durable impression on his enemies." 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 47 

tions, or of making even an insinuation unfiivorable to bis 
character." 

In one respect, however, he certainly Avas unprepared 
for his new duties, being without any experience whatever, 
either in the details of teaching or in the order and govern- 
ment of a large literary institution. As a practical man, he 
knew how serious this deficiency was; but he also knew in 
what way it could be supplied. For the first six months of 
his presidenc}^, he gave himself entirely to the study of the 
processes of instruction and discipline, as they went on under 
his eyes; acting, meanwhile, under the constant advisement 
of Professor Ware, for whose judgment in these matters he 
always entertained the highest respect. It Avas not until 
after this, so far as the internal arrangements of the College 
were concerned, that he began to have an opinion of his own, 
and to cause his influence to be felt. It may also be men- 
tioned, as illustrating his nice sense of justice, that, while 
Professor Ware was thus helping him to govern the College, 
he insisted on his receiving a portion of the President's 
salary. 

With these qualifications, and in this spirit, he began his 
long administration, — only four of the twenty have been 
longer, — an administration which will ever hold an honor- 
able place in the annals of the College, whether regard be 
had to its internal or external relations. 

In what he did for its internal discipline, there was nothing 
which he looked back upon with more satisfaction than his 
success in introducing the practice of appealing to the laws 
of the land in cases of grave offence committed by members 
of the University. The measure had been resorted to before 
in rare and exceptional instances, but Mr. Quincy made it to 
be a part of the recognized policy of the College, and caused 
it to be inserted as such in the College Code. It was not 
so much for the purpose of bringing the students under new 
penalties, as of obtaining the means, through the grand jury, 



48 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

of compelling testimony under oath, and so of bringing to light 
the real culprits. Examinations before the Faculty were often 
worse than useless. What was called " College morality " 
justified all kinds of prevarication and subterfuge to screen 
the guilty ; or, if the witness shrank from such a course, 
what was called " College honor," constrained him to refuse 
to testify, thus taking the punishment on himself. In a long 
address to the students, in October, 1829, announcing and re- 
commending the new policy, he thus accounts for the origin 
of these abuses : — 

" The reason is, that youth are here denied the common principles 
of examination and trial, by which alone truth can be maintained and 
error detected. The Board charged with tliese investigations are en- 
trusted with none of those powers by which alone society defends its 
safety and property. Had the tribunals of justice no other means of 
enforcing the discoveiy of truth than those possessed by the Faculty 
of a college, society could not exist a day." 

A few years afterwards, in the serious College disturb- 
ances of 1834, the courts of law were again resorted to, and 
indictments were found against three students. The proceed- 
ing occasioned some uneasiness, as well within as without 
academic circles, and was finally brought up for consideration 
before the Overseers ; which led Mr. Quincy to undertake be- 
fore that Board a still more elaborate defence of the policy 
in question. In the course of the argument he observes, — 

"Farther reflection, however, led to the conclusion that the so-called 
* College morality ' itself, complained of above, was not so much the 
effect of any peculiar perversity in the youthful mind, arising from 
influences existing within the sphere of a college, as the natural and 
even necessary consequence of a pretended immunity from the laws of 
the State. AVhen once the certainty of being examined under oath 
and confronted with each other, as in courts of justice, is established, 
the power of obtaining impunity by falsehood is taken away, and with 
this the temptation to commit it. Of all principles of moral cori'up- 
tion, in youth or manhood, that is the surest and most effectual which 
places the individual above or beyond the sanctions of the law." . . . 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 49 

" The notion that this exemption from the laws of the land is a 
privilege to students, is of all opinions the most false and fallacious. 
A privilege ! To whom ? Not to the orderly and well-disposed. To 
these it is an oppressive and insupportable evil. By the eftect of such 
exemption they are deprived of the character of compelled witnesses, 
and obliged to take that of voluntary informers, if they speak the 
truth." 

The whole subject was then referred by the Overseers to a 
Committee, John Quincy Adams being the chairman, who, in 
an able and extended report, approved of every thing which 
the President and Faculty had done ; and the resolutions 
embodying the sense of the report Avere " unanimously '' 
adopted by the Board.* The good effects of the new deter- 
mination were not, perhaps, so immediate or so considerable 
as expected: up to this hour, indeed, it has been but im- 
perfectly carried out ; but there can be no doubt that it 
was the beginning of a more efficient administration of col- 
lege discipline. It is probably one of the causes which, for a 
quarter of a century, have prevented the recurrence of an 
open and general "rebellion" against the College authorities, 
— formerly so frequent, almost periodic. It is also thought 
to have done much to save the College from those violent col- 
lisions between officers and students, sometimes ending in 
homicide, by which similar institutions in this country have 
been troubled. In every instance of mere college mischief, 



* Alluding in the Report to certain strictures which the Senior Class had seen fit, in 
their published account of the disturbances, to pass on the Head of the College, Mr. 
Adams says, " For nearly five and forty years, since President Quincy took, as a mem- 
ber of the then Senior Class of Harvard Universit}% at the close of his career as a student, 
the higliest honors of the Seminarj% his life, his deportment, his manners, may emphati- 
cally be said to have been exhibited in the presence of all his brethren. The life of no 
man of his cotemporarics has been more constantly under the eye of the public. It is 
not for this Committee to pronounce his panegyric: to many members of this Board he 
was long familiarly and intimately known, before any one member of the present Senior 
Class of Harvard University was born. He was known to their fathers, — known to 
many of their grandsires, in multiplied relations of life, public and private. It was re- 
served for the circular of the Senior Class of Harvard University to convey, in doubting 
and dubious terms, an imputation upon his sincerity and integrity." 

7 



50 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

the prosecution has led to confession; whereupon the prose- 
cution has been withdrawn, the College falling back on col- 
lege punishments as soon as the real culprits were known. 

There was another subject intimately connected with the 
peace of the College and its proper relations to the commu- 
nity, by which Mr. Quincy's mind was much exercised. It 
will be remembered that the people were beginning, at this 
time, to be divided and intensely exasperated on a multitude 
of new questions and new projects. In the ordinary relations 
of life, he was not a man, as we have seen, to counsel or 
practise timid reserves or a non-committal policy. But he 
felt that a retreat for study should be kept as far removed as 
possible from the noisy and distracting strifes of the hour. 
Moreover, he was eminently a just man. He knew that he 
had no right to use the influence, or complicate the interests 
and prospects of a great public institution placed under Jiis 
care, as he might his own. He knew that Harvard College 
belonged to no party, or sect, or clique ; and he therefore 
strove, both by example and authority, to keep it free from 
all such entanglements on the one side or the other. 

Thus, in 1838, having been informed that a discussion was 
announced for the evening, in some society belonging to the 
Divinity School, " on the subject of 'Abolition,' as it is called," 
and that very general invitations had been given to the un- 
dergraduates, and to the members of the respective schools, 
to attend on the occasion, he hastened to apprise the Theolo- 
gical Faculty of the fact, and to express his regret and con- 
cern on account of it. In the course of this communication 
he observes : " Whatever may be your or my private opinion 
on the main question, I think there can be but one in the 
minds of prudent men, that, in the state of excessive excita- 
bility of the public mind on this topic abroad, it is desirable 
not to introduce it obtrusively into a seminary of learning, 
composed of young men from every quarter of the country ; 
among whom are many whose prejudices, passions, and inter- 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 51 

ests are deeply implicated and affected by these discussions, 
and who feel very naturally and strongly on the subject." 
Again, in 1840, he writes to a tutor, reminding him of the 
circumstances which attended his appointment: "I then dis- 
tinctly stated to you, that there was no sense of official duty 
more imperative in my mind than that of keeping Harvard 
College out of every paiiy vortex, and that I held it an incum- 
bent duty of every officer of the Institution to abstain from 
any act tending to bring within its walls discussions upon 
questions on which the passions and interests of the com- 
munity are divided, and warmly engaged, without doors." 

For several years, many of the friends of the College had 
been urging important reforms in its course and methods of 
instruction, rendered necessary, as it was said, by the wants 
of the community and the advanced state of science. Lit- 
tle, however, had as yet been done towards maturing these 
schemes, and carrying them into effect ; and one of the hopes 
entertained on the appointment of Mr. Qiiincy was, that they 
would soon begin to feel the effects of that indomitable spirit 
of activity and progress which he had just been evincing as 
Mayor. And this hope was not disappointed. In June, 1830, 
he submitted to the Board of Overseers " A General Plan of 
Studies," designed " chiefly to effect a more thorough edu- 
cation in the Greek and Latin languages, the Mathematics, 
and Rhetoric." According to the new program, the hours 
given to the first three studies above mentioned are nearly 
doubled, without lessening the amount of instruction in the 
other departments. Here, certainly, was early evidence of 
activity and progress ; but not, it must be confessed, in the 
popular direction. Most of the reformers believed that abun- 
dant time was given already to mathematical and classical 
studies : what they wanted was, that more room should be 
made, at least for such as desired it, for the moral and physi- 
cal sciences and the modern languages. They deaianded, in 
short, that a much larger privilege of selection among dif- 



52 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

ferent studies should be allowed ; that classes should be 
divided into sections, according to talent and proficiency ; 
that examinations should be rendered more thorough and 
effective ; that rank should be determined by a carefully and 
elaborately prepared scale of merit ; and that the College 
should be open to students wishing to avail themselves of 
its means of instruction in particular departments, without 
being candidates for a degree.* 

Mr. Quincy is understood to have had his doubts, from 
the beginning, as to the wisdom or practicability of some 
of these propositions. Nevertheless, as they had been re- 
peatedly recommended and insisted on, and sometimes by 
the authorities of the College, he was sincerely desirous, 
acting in concert with the Faculty, to put them to the test 
of experience. And it was remarkable in Mr. Quincy, that, 
whenever he felt called upon to execute a plan, he threw 
his whole soul into it, forgetting all objections and misgivings 
he may himself have once entertained, and acting as if the 
entire scheme, from its inception, was his own. This appears 
in the course he took in 1832, respecting what was then 
called, " The Minimum Scheme." It consisted in establish- 
ing a minimum in every important branch, which was re- 
quired of all as the condition of a degree. But " any number 
of students in any class, not less than six, wishing to attain 
this minimum in an early part of the College course, might 
form a section for that purpose." Having effected this object, 
they were free to elect what studies they would afterwards 



* See on this subject a Report of a Committee of the Overseers in 1824, of which 
Judge Story and Mr. John Pickering Avere active members ; " Remarks on a Report of 
a Committee of the Overseers of Hai"\-ard College, proposing certain Changes in the In- 
struction and Discipline of the College. By One, lately a Member of the Immediate 
Government" [Professor Norton], 1824; "Remarks on Changes lately proposed or 
adopted in Harvard Universky. By George Tieknor, Smith Professor, &c.," 1825; 
" Speech of John Pickering, Esq., before the Board of Overseers," published in the 
"American Statesman," for Feb. 1, 1825; and an article on "Reform of Harvard Col- 
lege," in the "United-States Literary Gazette," begun June 15, and continued through 
successive issues to Dec. 1, 1825, by Dr. Gamaliel Bradford. 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 53 

pursue, and " be formed into sections in reference to those 
studies, without regard to classes.''^ Again, in the following 
year, he was equally in earnest for another plan, which con- 
sisted in confining the required study of Greek, Latin, and 
Mathematics to the Freshman and Sophomore Classes, so that 
students who were unprepared in those studies might enter 
the Junior Class, and take a two-years' college course in In- 
tellectual, Moral, and Political Philosophy, in the Physical 
Sciences, and in the Modern Languages. The latter would 
not be entitled to a degree ; but, in lieu thereof, they were 
to receive a diploma specifying what they had done. 

Both of these projects fell through, because they were 
found to require a larger staif of instruction than the Col- 
lege had at its disposal. But in other respects he was more 
successful ; especially in the measures agreed upon to secure 
a perfectly reliable scale of merit, an improved method of 
public examinations, and a large extension of the elective 
system. For a time, indeed, the elective system was car- 
ried so far as to allow any student to discontinue the study 
of Greek, Latin, and Mathematics, one or all, at the end of 
the Freshman year, choosing a substitute out of several stud- 
ies proposed, among which were the Modern Languages. 
Many were alarmed at this bold innovation, thinking it little 
better than an abandonment of the classics altogether ; so 
much so, that Mr. Quincy felt called upon to come forward 
in its defence, in " Remarks on the Nature and Probable 
Effects of introducing the Yoluntary System," addressed to 
the Board of Overseers, in 1841. He argues thus: — 

" Now, what possible objection can there be to permitting parents 
or guardians, who know the character, aptitudes, and destination of 
their sons or wards, to decide the question for them ? Is it possible, 
in the nature of things, that what is best in every individual case can 
be better decided by the principles of a general system than by the 
intelUgence of the natural guardians of a young man, acting upon a 
knowledge of his peculiar powers, temperament, and objects in lite ? 



54 MEMOIE OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

If a parent chooses that his son shall not spend more than one college 
year in imbuing his mind with>a knowledge of Greek and Latin, what 
concern has the College or the friends of classical literature in the 
matter, provided he do not obstruct others in attaining it? How- 
much less concern, then, have they, — rather, how much reason to en- 
courage and rejoice in this voluntary secession from these studies, when 
the direct effect must be to aid, and take obstructions from the path of, 
those who engage ardently in the pursuit of these languages ! . . . 

" A college which should send forth only two-thirds, or even one- 
half, of its graduates, thoroughly educated by a known and seen stand- 
ard, by which they were faithfully tried and rejected if found wanting, 
and if approved receive the appropriate honor, will do more for the 
cause of classical learning, than twenty colleges who send forth all 
their members tried by no standard, without any evidence of attain- 
ment, except having passed through a prescribed process, and where 
what they have done is matter of faith and not of sight." 

If it sliould still be objected that he did not do as much as 
was expected for academic reform, the answer is found in the 
fact that he did more than the College has been able to re- 
tain. At the present moment, though a re-action is under- 
stood to be now going on in favor of the elective or proper 
University system, that principle is not carried out and ap- 
plied to any tiling like the same extent as under President 
Quincy's administration. Moreover, we must not shut our 
ejes to another fact, — namely, that there was, and is, a seri- 
ous difficulty in the way, though one, we are glad to say, tliat 
is continually lessening.'^ A large proportion of our Fresh- 



* In the four consecutive j-ears, beginning with 1806, the average age of students 
entering Harvard College, was sixteen years and four months ; in the four consecutive 
years beginning with 1820, it was sixteen years and eleven mouths; in the four con- 
secutive years beginning with 18C0, it was seventeen years and eight months. But there 
is another view to be taken of the comparative age of the students, which makes the 
change more notewortliy. In the tirst two of the above-mentioned groups of classes, 
many entered under fifteen, and nearly half under sixteen; while in the last, out of four 
hundred and seventy-seven admitted, there was but one under fifteen, and only eighteen 
under sixteen. This change has been brought about, for the most part, by the higher 
character and greater strictness of the examination for admission ; but, if more is now 
exacted, it is almost exclusively in one branch, the ancient languages, and is not under- 
stood to involve any essential change of general policy. A vast amount of rudimental 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 55 

man and Sophomore Classes, whether regard be had to their 
age or studies, ought rather to be at some pubHc school 
or gymnasium. The instruction required, or most of it at 
least, might be given there to better advantage, at less ex- 
pense, and with far less moral exposure. As things now are, 
it may certainly be said, with no little show of reason, of 
these classes at least, that they have not as yet completed the 
general and preliminary studies which are necessary to a 
liberal education ; and therefore that, for them, the time has 
not come to talk about dropping one study, and taking up 
another. And besides, even if they were to do so, who sup- 
poses that the mere right of selection among a crowd of ele- 
mentary studies will make a university ? Undoubtedly these 
elementary studies must first be attended to and mastered ; 
but a university is not the place for it. Whenever Harvard 
College is ready to take the stand of leaving all rudimentary 
and drill teaching to the preparatory seminaries, and open its 
doors wide to persons of maturity, and to them alone, — that 
is to say, to persons who must be presumed to know what 
high special teaching they are fitted for and require, — the 
Voluntary or Elective System, without restriction or limita- 



instructiou is still expected and provided for in the College: it is, however, an important 
gain, that more than a year has been added to the average age of the students. 

Some are disposed to comisel contentment with things as they are, on the ground, 
that, as our colleges have grown up amidst our wants, thej' must be suited to them. But 
this is a fallacy. Though our colleges have grown up amidst our wants, they have never 
been what the countiy really required, but only what it was in a condition to do for the 
time being, — a compromise between our wants and our means. Again, there are those 
who are willing that the College should sink into a mere preparatory department for the 
Professional and Scientitic Schools, the latter to be regarded as the University proper. But 
the sons of Harvard will be slow to acquiesce in this view. It is hardly necessary to add, 
that the advocates of change have no wish to slight or crowd out the classics and the pure 
mathematics : on the contrary, they would provide the means of a much higher instruc- 
tion in both, as well as in everj' other branch of liberal culture, for such as wish it, and will 
give the time to it. As for what is said about the disciplinaiy eflect of different studies, 
it applies almost exclusively to boj's. After the mind has attained a certain degree of 
maturity and independence, we suspect that the amount of intellectual discipline any 
study aribrds will depend in no small measure on the interest taken in it, or the pref- 
erence from some cause felt for it; in short, on the student's " working with a will." 



56 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

tion, will follow as a matter of course, and the College will 
become a proper university ; — then, and except in a very 
imperfect degree, not until then. 

We have dwelt on Mr. Quincy's efforts to improve the dis- 
cipline and instruction of the College proper, because this 
was a care that was always on his mind ; but it did not tempt 
him to overlook or neglect any other branch or interest of 
the Universit}^ Witness the new impulse which was almost 
immediately given to the Law School. Provision had been 
made, it is true, several years before, for giving legal instruc- 
tion in the University ; and this had been done with ability 
and success, but on a comparatively limited scale. The Law 
School, as at present constituted, may be said to date from 
the inauguration of Judge Story and Mr. Ashmun as pro- 
fessors, which took place Aug. 25, 1829, — a few months after 
President Quincy entered upon office. He had much to do 
with the change ; and it was also owing, in no small measure, 
to his activity and perseverance, that funds were found for 
the erection of Dane Hall, in 1832. Writing, about this time, 
to the Hon. Nathan Dane, of Beverly, who had founded a 
new professorship, and after whom the new Hall was named, 
he says, " The School is flourishing beyond all expectation. 
It already consists of thirty-five members. Five or six more 
are known to contemplate joining it, and others are antici- 
pated. We think ourselves justified in calculating with cer- 
tainty on forty members, and I have reason to think it will 
exceed that number." Before Mr. Quincy resigned his office, 
the number had grown to be one hundred and sixty-three, 
collected from almost every State in the Union. 

His attention was soon drawn to another important object. 
The College Library, which had become considerable, and 
the loss of which would have been in some respects irre- 
trievable, was still in the upper story of Harvard Hall, where 
it was neither conveniently nor safely provided for. He saw 
that a new building had become necessary ; and his first step 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 57 

was to importune the Legislature for aid in erecting'it ; — 
urging, among other things, that the first library of the Col- 
lege had been burnt, in 1764, together with the Hall in which 
it was deposited, while the latter was in temporary occupa- 
tion by the General Court ; and further, that the benefits of 
the Library, when increased as it was likely to be, would not 
accrue to the College alone, but to all scholars, and the public 
generally. Meeting, however, with no response from that 
quarter, he reluctantly consented, and induced a majority of 
the Corporation to consent, that a great part of Mr. Gore's 
large bequest, which was shackled by no conditions, should 
be devoted to this purpose. To him, therefore, under these 
circumstances, the College is indebted for Gore Hall, which 
was built in the years 1839-42. 

Another subject on which Mr. Quincy's thoughts were much 
occupied during the last years of his presidency, and indeed 
to the end of his life, was the Astronomical Observatory. A 
movement had been made by the Corporation as early as 
1815, probably the earliest in the country, for the establish- 
ment of such an institution; and another, in 1822; but neither 
was followed up by the energy necessary to success. Mr. 
Quincy, in a letter to John Quincy Adams, who had been 
among the most active in recommending the former attempts, 
gives the following account of the first steps taken by 
himself : — 

" Early in the year 1839, the President of the University being 
informed that Mr. WiUiam Cranch Bond was engaged, under con- 
tract Avith the government of the United States, in a series of astro- 
nomical, meteorological, and magnetic observations at Dorchester, 
with reference to the Exploring Expedition of the United States then 
in the Southern Ocean, it occurred to him, that if Mr. Bond could be 
induced to transfer his residence and apparatus to Cambridge, and 
pursue his observations there under the auspices of the University, it 
would have an important influence in clearing the way for an estab- 
lishment of an efficient Observatory in connection with that seminary, 

8 



58 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

•by the increase of the apparatus at its command, by the interest 
which the observations making by Mr. Bond were calculated to ex- 
cite ; and, by drawing the attention of the citizens of Boston and its 
vicinity to the great inadequacy of the means possessed by the Uni- 
versity for efficient astronomical observations, create a desire and a 
disposition to supply them." 

Every thing succeeded according to his wishes and expecta- 
tions. Mr. Bond removed to Cambridge, where a temporary 
observatory had been fitted tip for him in connection with the 
Dana House, situated within the college grounds. The neces- 
sary funds were immediately raised for purchasing additional 
instruments ; and a much larger sum soon afterwards, for 
erecting and equipping the present noble Observatory, which, 
under the direction of the two Bonds,- father and son, has 
already reflected so much credit on the College and on Ameri- 
can science. Ground was broken for laying the foundation of 
the central pier, Aug. 15, 1843. To defray the current ex- 
penses of the establishment, the College received, in 1848, 
a bequest of a hundred thousand dollars from Mr. Edward 
Bromfield Phillips, a kinsman and former ward of Mr. Quin- 
cy ; and ten thousand dollars were also given by himself to 
the same object.'^ 

Time would fail, were we to undertake a full enumeration 
of the benefits accruing to Harvard College under President 
Quincy's administration. He found the whole number of 
students on his accession to office to be, including all depart- 
ments of the University, four hundred and one ; when he left, 
it was six hundred and twenty-one. He found a corps of 



* Mr. Quincy's donation was in fulfilment of liis father's bequest of £2,000 ster- 
ling to the College, in case his son should die a minor. He used to say that the 
College should not be a loser for his unreasonableness in outliving the prescribed term. 
The donation makes part of the Publishing Fund of the Observatory; and he directed 
that the following insertion should be made in the titlepage of every volume, the 
expense of which is defrayed from this source: "Printed from Funds resulting from 
the Will of Josiah Quincy, Jun., who died in April, 1775, leaving a Name inseparably 
connected with the History of the American Revolution." The whole transaction was 
very characteristic of the donor. 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 59 

twenty-one professors and teachers ; he left a corps of twenty- 
nine. He found the College yard a narrow and irregular strip 
of land, less than two-thirds of what it is at present: he left 
it not only greatly enlarged, but bounded on all sides by 
public streets. He found the financial concerns of the College 
in considerable embarrassment: he left them in perfect order. 
He found the productive funds of the University amount- 
ing to 1150,903.90 : he left them amounting to $706,615.24. 
Here too, without question, much was due to the ability 
and faithfulness of his colleagues in the government ; still, as 
was said before, Mr. Quincy was not a man to be nominally 
the efficient and controlling head of an institution without 
being really so. 

In the discharge' of the current duties of his office as 
President of the University, he was as prompt, as unwearied, 
and as punctilious, as he had been in every previous public 
trust. An opinion had long prevailed, which was expressed 
and dwelt upon in the Report to the Overseers in 1824, that 
the President should be relieved " from the performance of 
merely ministerial duties," such as granting leave of absence, 
and attending to ordinary matters of discipline. But Mr. 
Quincy was the last man in the world to ask for or accept 
an exemption from work or care or responsibility, under 
whatever shape it might come. Even the details, the routine 
of the office, irksome as they have been thought, had a sort of 
fascination for his intensely active nature; and he would listen 
to no suggestions of curtailment or assistance. He was al- 
ways in his place. For sixteen years he was never absent 
from the College chapel at morning prayers but once, and 
then on account of necessary absence from town on College 
business. Probably it was this entering into, and identifying 
himself with, every measure and movement of the University 
that rendered him so sensitive to attacks upon it. If more of 
these attacks had been left unnoticed, it might, perhaps, have 
been as well ; especially when^ as was sometimes the case, 



60 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

they originated in political or religious jealousies, which it 
was impossible either to silence or allay. All tliat many 
of tlie assailants hoped for was to raise a question and call 
forth an answer, knowing how injurious it is to an individual 
or an institution to be frequent!}" coming before the public as 
defendant, no matter how able and successful each particular 
defence may be. 

But there was one instance in Avhich his opposition to en- 
croachments on the settled policy of the College deserves par- 
ticular mention, as it gave him an opportunity to express his 
profound sense of the obligations the College has been under 
to the Congregational clergy from its earliest days, and also to 
show that he was not one of those who are carried' away 
by every new cry of " liberality." Until 1834, clergymen, 
to be eligible to the Board of Overseers, must be Congrega- 
tionalists ; but an Act was passed by the Legislature of that 
year, opening the Board to clergymen of all denominations, — 
the Act to take effect whenever accepted by both branches 
of the College government. That little or no general inter- 
est was taken in the proposition is evident from the fact, 
that it was allowed to slumber in the statute-book for nearly 
nine years, without inquiry or complaint from any quarter. 
At length a vote of the Overseers called the attention of the 
President and Fellows to the existence of this law, with a 
request that they would take the initiative on the question 
of its acceptance. Under these circumstances, Mr. Quincy 
brought up the subject for consideration, declaring, at the 
same time, his own opinion in a written and elaborate argu- 
ment against the measure ; in which, as usual, he is not a 
whit the less decided and confident, though perfectly aware 
the effort would be of no avail, and that he was likely to 
stand, as in fact he did, almost alone. As this document has 
never been printed, an extract or two, illustrative of his 
views of the external relations of the University, will not 
be improper. •* 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 61 

" The whole history of Massachusetts," as he tells us, " bears wit- 
ness to the instrumentality of the Congregational clergy in foimdino- 
and upholding Harvard College. With them originated the first con- 
ception of the design. By their influence, which was scarcely less 
than conclusive with the first settlers of the Colony, its statesmen were 
induced to extend to it the degree of favor which they did. For one 
hundred and fifty years they were intrusted with its chief care and 
management. When it became necessaiy, in the Convention of 1780, 
to declare who should be the successors of the Board of Overseers 
established under the ancient charters of the College, the framers of 
the Constitution ordained, in conformity with those charters, that the 
ministers of the Congregational churches therein specified should still 
constitute the clerical jjart of that Board. Nor did the act of 1810 
make any alteration in this respect, but continued the Congregational 
order in its long-established clerical relations and rights, — enlarging 
rather than restricting them. . . . 

" Thus the right in question is granted to the Congregational order 
by all the charters of the institution. It is a right which the present 
members of that order and their predecessors have attained, not 
through any party spirit or favoritism, but from the fact that they were 
originally the efficient founders of the College, and have, in all times, 
by their zeal, labors, and influence, been greatly instrumental in pro- 
moting its growth and prosperity. Now, where do the Overseers and 
the Corporation obtain the power to deprive the great Congregational 
Order of Massachusetts of this right, so honorably won and main- 
tained ? ... 

" But, it has been said, this change Avill not materially affect the 
influence of the Congregational clergy ; that it will still depend upon 
the votes of the Board of Overseers, whether any other and what 
denominations shall be admitted, and that they will of course restrict 
the selection to such as will harmonize with them. All this is very 
smooth and lubricating. But powers which are sought are generally 
intended to be used. Accretion and extension are inherent in the very 
nature of power. If ' liberality ' reqiTires that all denominations should 
be made eligible to the Board of Overseers, it also requires, just as 
much, that every denomination should be represented in it. And it 
cannot be doubted, that, on every occurrence of a clerical vacancy in the 
Board, the friends of every sect will put in its claim ; and, if denied, 
there will result a great clamor about ' illiberality.' So that they who 
are for accepting this act will find to their cost, that, instead of attain- 



62 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

ing their end, they have perpetuated the very evil they would avoid 
upon themselves, and entailed -it on their successors." 

Experience did not verify these apprehensions : the Col- 
lege continued to flourish under the new order of things. 
Still, in these days of hankering after change and a more 
aesthetic worship, it is a satisfaction to know that there was 
one man who never forgot that his ancestors were Congrega- 
tionalists, and who had the courage, in the face of all the 
popular tendencies, to stand up for what he believed to be 
the rights of the Congregational clergy, — a body of men, 
to whom, with all their faults. New England is mainly indebted 
for what is most distinctive in its history, institutions, and 
character. 

Amidst his many official cares, little and great, President 
Quincy found time for no inconsiderable amount of literary 
work. In 1830 he delivered an " Address to the Citizens 
of Boston on the Close of the Second Century from the First 
Settlement of the City," It is one of the most carefully pre- 
pared, and most discriminating and valuable, of all his public 
addresses. He was also called, Sept. 8, 1836, at the close 
of the second century after the foundation of the College, to 
deliver a discourse in commemoration of that event. The 
latter, though eloquent and elaborate in itself, was chiefly 
remarkable for having suggested and prepared the way for 
his extended History of the institution. After having glanced 
at the four great periods, under which the events affecting the 
fortunes of the College may be conveniently arranged and 
considered, he thus proceeds: — 

" From this view it is apparent, that the occasion requires, not an 
oration, but a treatise ; not au address, but a History. 

" Like the historian, then, of ancient times, when, on Grecian soil 
and like solemn occasion, were assembled, as now and here, the wise, 
the learned, the pious, and the great, let us also strive to beguile the 
passing hour with an appropriate story of former years ; and like him, 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCT. 63 

too, leave it half told, when hearers give signs of weariness, or when 
the herald shall proclaim that the time has come for the feast and the 
games." 

His " History of Harvard University " did not appear un- 
til 1840. It was a labor of love. The records and archives 
of the College were all open to him ; and no expense was 
spared in order to make this work the most acceptable and 
enduring monument of his devotion to his Alma Mater. It 
fills two large octavo volumes, and, in point of mechanical 
execution, is still universally regarded as one of the most 
beautiful and perfect productions of the American press. 
The first impression of seven hundred and fifty copies, in- 
cluding the whole charge for the stereotype plates, cost 
above six thousand dollars. Having no view to pecuniary 
emolument, Mr. Quincy, at the outset, made over his prop- 
erty in the work to the College, guaranteeing it in any event 
against loss, and providing that the profits, if any, should 
accrue to the funds for assisting indigent students. After 
the first and principal sales had been effected, the balance 
against the work, from various unforeseen causes, amounted 
to between three and four thousand dollars, which was 
promptly paid by the author, leaving the College in posses- 
sion of the remaining copies and the stereotype plates, free 
of all expense. 

The History was cordially welcomed by the friends of the 
College, and especially by those most conversant with its 
interests and traditions. The Hon. Daniel Appleton White, 
to make room for one among many, writes thus : — 

" By combining with your narrative of University concerns a variety 
of important public topics, and ai*ranging them judiciously, with lively 
and graphic sketches of character, you have made your work exceed- 
ingly attractive to all readers of American history and literature. . . . 
You have presented a striking and most satisfactory view of the 
ecclesiastical history of Massachusetts, — the most so, indeed, that I 
recollect to have met with. Some persons may remain who will be 



64 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

at first shocked at the picture drawn of the two Mathers and of Han- 
cock, if not of a few others 4 but in this the author of the History 
cannot be blamed, as it must be perceived the portraits are of their 
own drawing. Nothing can be more manifest to the reader of this 
History than the author's determined spirit of candor, justice, and fidel- 
ity, as well as of independence." * 

Now that first impressions have given place to calm and 
mature judgment, we are in a condition to speak with more 
confidence and discrimination of the merits of this work. In 
the first place, every student of history will know hoAV to 
appreciate the Aj)pendixes to the two volumes, embracing, as 
they do, a large collection of interesting and important docu- 
ments, which are thus saved, and in some cases, it might 
almost be said, redeemed from destruction. Turning, next, 
to the History itself, all again must agree in according to it 
the qualities of a permanent and standard work. The author, 
it is true, wrote too eagerly and too rapidly for one who 
would become a model of exactness and finish : his mind was 
taken up by other things ; nevertheless, his diction is always 
clear, strong, and idiomatic, rising at times into a genuine, 
because spontaneous, eloquence ; and distinguished through- 
out by a certain air of independence and nobility, which 



* We cannot refrain from subjoining the testimony of a foreigner, Mr. James 
Grahame, the author of" The History of the United States." In a letter to Mr. Quincy, 
from Nantes, July, 1841, he says: "As you advance, you wound some of my preju- 
dices. The Mathers are very dear to me; and you attack them with a severity the 
more painful to me that I am unable to demur to its justice. I would fain think that 
you do not make sufficient allowance for the spirit of the times. My heart and judg- 
ment are with them in point of doctrine. From their view of discipline my judgment 
utterly revolts." Again, writing to Mr. Quincy's daughter in the following Octoder, 
he observes: "Since my return from my late travels, I have thoroughly read your 
father's ' History of Harvard University,' often with pleasure, sometimes with pain, — 
always with final, deep, austere satisfaction and approbation. ... No other country 
than your own ever produced a seat of learning so honorable to its founders and early 
supporters as Harvard University; and never did a noble institution obtain a worthier 
historian. . . . His account of the transition of the social system of Massachusetts from 
an entire and punctilious intertexture of Church and State to the restriction of mu- 
nicipal government to civil offices and occupations, is very curious and interesting, and 
admirably well fills up an important void in New-England history." 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 65 

marked his style as well as his thoughts, and indeed his 
whole character. Then, too, it is quite plain that the records 
and archives of the University have been thoroughly ex- 
plored for information respecting its internal history ; by 
which is meant the changes in its internal constitution, its 
methods of instruction and discipline, and its standard of 
scholarship at different periods. It is doubtless to be re- 
gretted that the result is often so meagre and unsatisfactory ; 
still we have all, or nearly all, the light on these subjects to 
be gathered from the books and papers of the College. More 
might perhaps have been done to fill out the picture from 
other sources ; and there are those, probably, who would 
have liked the history better if it had been written on this 
principle, and in the spirit of an academic and literary anti- 
quary. But such a work was not, of course, to be expected 
from Mr. Quincy. All his tastes and habits of thought, as a 
public man, had led him to be chiefly interested in the exter- 
nal history of the College ; that is to say, in the history of 
its governors rather than of its teachers and teaching, and in 
its relations to public affairs, and to the rivalships and strug- 
gles of the leading men in Church and State. 

By thus following his natural bent, he has doubtless given 
to the work a peculiar interest and importance ; but with 
the inconvenience, that he often found himself on debatable 
ground, where, take whatever position he might, he was sure 
to be met by the stock objections on the other side.* Some- 
thing must also be pardoned to an ardent mind, which is apt 



* Two articles containing strictures on the woric appeared in the sixth and seventh 
vohimes of the " American Biblical Repositorj-," — namely, a " Review of Quincy's His- 
tory of Harvard University. By One of the Professors of Yale College" (Professor 
Kingsley); and an "Examination of Certain Points in New-England History, as ex- 
hibited by President Quincy in his Histoiy of Harvard University, and by other Uni- 
tarian Writers. By Enoch Pond, D.D." It was favorably noticed by the Rev. Dr. 
Parkman, in the " Christian Examiner" for March, 1841, and also, thougli with some 
discriminations, by Dr. Palfrey, in the " North American Review " for April in the same 
year. 

9 



66 MEMOIE OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

to see things through an intensifying medium.. Not that he 
confounded white with black, or black with white ; but his 
white was sometimes a little whiter, and his black a little 
blacker, than the reality. Add to this, that, misled by ap- 
proved authorities, he has fallen into some errors of fact ; for 
instance, as to the influence of Sewell and Addington in fram- 
ing the Charter of Yale College, and perhaps in some of his 
statements respecting the Mathers. But none of these things 
affect, in any manner or degree, his great argument ; which 
shows, that, for tlje last century and a half. Harvard College 
has been under the constant patronage and control of what 
may be called the liberal party of Massachusetts, using the 
term " liberal " to denote, not the opinions held, but the 
spirit in which they were held, Down to a comparatively 
recent date, the governors and teachers of the College were 
Orthodox Congregationalists. If it has since passed, to a cer- 
tain extent, under other influences, we have no right to say 
that it has passed into other hands. The change in the Col- 
lege was preceded or attended by a like change in the 
surrounding community. The very same class of men who 
have had ascendency in the College for many generations, 
and who have made it what it is, have ascendency still ; the 
only difference being, that the minds of this class have gradu- 
ally become more and more liberal in spirit, and many of 
them also in doctrine. 

At one time Mr. Quincy had it in view to reply to the 
exceptions taken to his History. But he soon perceived that 
these exceptions related, for the most part, to inferences re- 
specting character and motives, the justice or injustice of 
which his readers were already in a condition to determine 
for themselves. Or if, in a few cases, they extended to facts, 
it was, as a general rule, simply because these facts w^ere re- 
garded from a different point of view and with different pre- 
possessions. Under these circumstances, the continuance of 
the discussion was not likely to be of any avail ; and, besides, 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 67 

it would require that almost every question involved in the 
study of the early history of New England should be re- 
opened, — a useless and thankless task, to which he did not 
feel himself to be called. He begins a manuscript containing 
some brief and unfinished notices of his reviewers with these 
solemn asseverations: — 

" If ever a work was written with an entire independence of any 
design to shape the course of the narrative to favor or disparage 
any religious sect or opinion, it was that work. For, so far as any 
human being is conscious, or has a right to speak, concerning his 
own state of mind or motive, I was utterly indifferent to the whole 
controversy. ... I have no intention to enter into a controversy, in 
the results of which I have no interest, and concerning which, owing 
to the length and number of the discussions on the subject, almost 
any thing may be asserted, and almost any thing denied. All differ- 
ences about the character and conduct of individuals ai"e fair subjects 
of criticism and contradiction. On re-examining them, so far as my 
History is concerned, I see nothing to retract." 

Again, in answering a letter from a friend some years after- 
wards, he writes as follows : — 

" You have several times intimated to me a wish, that, previously 
to publishing a second edition of my ' History of Harvard College,' I 
Avould I'eview and consider the objections which have been made to 
some of my conclusions and inferences concerning the history of the 
period to which it relates, affecting sometimes the character of men 
and sometimes of parties, varying from, if not offending, the preju- 
dices or the sentiments of one or both the sectarian divisions which 
exist in our Commonwealth. Ahiiost all these objections, as far as 
in the course of their publication they have come to my knowledge, I 
have ah'eady considered, and they are generally of a nature which 
I cannot hope to overcome ; being, for the most part, the result of 
theological opinions, or connected with sectarian interests, which 
nothing can satisfy but victory." 

Mr. Quincy resigned the presidency of the College, Aug. 
27, 1845, at the age of seventy-three, — his bodily faculties 
but little affected by his years, and his mind not at all. He 



68 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

DOW returned to his former mode of life, passing his winters 
in Boston, and his summers on his estate in Quincy ; but with 
this difference, that, being relieved from all public cares, he 
could bestow his time as he pleased. Not a day, however, 
was lost. As soon as he found himself on his farm again, his 
old fondness for agricultural pursuits came back in all its 
freshness; and the more so, as he believed these pursuits to< 
afford the fittest occupation for an old man, — interesting 
without being exciting, and deriving their interest from 
causes which have nothing to do with the strifes and ambi- 
tions of the world. What makes it more remarkable is, that 
he was able, at his advanced age, not only to take the entire 
management of the farm into his own hands, but to retain it 
for more than ten years ; during which he was as intent as 
ever on new improvements, and as eager as ever to recom- 
mend them in conversation and by his pen. Nor was this all. 
It was at this period, and under these circumstances, that he 
added largely to his fortune by a bold and successful specu- 
lation, from which younger men shrunk, and the details of 
which are equally creditable to his foresight and to his public 
spirit. In the words of his son, — 

" When Mayor, he had built a wharf, called the City Wharf, which 
belonged to the City, and which from its position he thousht should 
always be held by it ; and this opinion he had left on record at the 
time. When he was more than eighty, the City Government proposed 
selling this property. Mr. Quincy remonstrated against it in the 
papers and by memorial, setting forth the reasons why it was impor- 
tant that the control of that particular piece of property should be 
retained by the City. The authoi'ities, however, proceeded with their 
scheme; and at the sale he appeared, and bid it off. Having thus the 
control of it, he wrote to the Mayor, offering to re-convey it to the City 
if it would bind itself not to sell it again for twenty years. The 
City refused, and he retained the property." 

Still, it was among his books, pen in hand, that most of his 
hours were passed. Long after he had attained to an age in 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 69 

which most persons find a reason or an excuse for leaving off 
work altogether, he was wont to regard it as a broken day if 
he were not busily engaged in his library from nine o'clock 
in the morning to nine in the evening. Nor were his studies 
without object, or without fruit. In 1847, when he was 
seventy-five, appeared his '^ Life and Journals of Major 
Samuel Shaw." This was followed, four years afterwards, 
by his " History of the Boston Athengeum, with Biographical 
Notices of its Deceased Founders." In 1852, at the close 
of his eightieth year, he published his " Municipal History 
of the Town and City of Boston." Finally, in 1858, in his 
eighty-seventh year, appeared his " Memoir of the Life of 
John Quincy Adams." Each of these works fills an octavo 
volume, and must have required a large amount of literary 
labor; j^et they betray, to the last, but little if any decay of 
intellectual vigor. The last work especially, if we consider 
the difiiculty and delicacy of the task, and the success with 
which it is executed, in connection with the extreme age of 
the author, is almost without a parallel. To these must also 
be added a "Memoir of James Grahame," the historian, and a 
" Memoir of John Bromfield," published during the same 
period ; together with several political and controversial 
pamphlets, called forth by the exigency of the times, — all 
of which are full of life, and often as effective and trenchant 
as the productions of his best days.* 

There was a time, as before intimated, when Mr. Quincy 



* Among these are found the following : " Considerations submitted to the Citizens 
of Boston and Charlestown on the proposed Annexation of these two Cities," 1854; 
"Speech delivered before the Whig State Convention, Boston, August 16, 1854;" "Ad- 
dress illustrative of the Nature and Power of the Slave States, and the Duties of the 
Free States; delivered at the request of the Inhabitants of the Town of Quincy, Mass., 
on Thursday'-, June 5, 1856, — Altered and Enlarged since Delivery ; " " Remarks on the 
Letter of the Hon. Rufus Choate to the Whig State Committee of Maine, written in 
answer to a Letter of the Hon. John Z. Goodrich," 1856; " Whig Policy Analyzed and 
Illustrated," 1856. The Memoir of Grahame was prepared at the request of the Massa- 
chusetts Historical Society, and published in their Collections, Third Series, vol. ix. 
His "Memoir of John Quincy Adams" was also written at the instance of this Society. 



70 MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

did not hesitate to express his want of confidence in the sta- 
bility of our government ; but he would say, on turning the 
conversation to other topics, " It will probably stand as long 
as I do." As, however, the political prospects of the coun- 
try continued to grow darker and darker, even this hope, if 
hope it might be called, began to fade away : he became 
convinced that the catastrophe might come at any moment. 
Amidst these gloomy forebodings, the first glimmer of light 
which he saw, or thought he saw, was in the Presidential 
canvass for Fremont in 1856; for, though unsuccessful, it 
showed that both the East and the West were beginning to 
awake to the Great Issue.* Accordingly, he threw himself 
into the contest with all the unabated ardor of his soul, as 
he afterwards did into that for Lincoln in 1860. When at 
length the Rebellion broke out, it gave a new life to all his 
old antipathies to the slave-power, heightened by a keener 
sense of the social and moral evil of slavery itself But what 
most impressed him, and this too with a kind of religious 
awe, was the madness of the South, forcing upon the country 
that very state of things which alone would make the final 
and utter extinction of slavery both possible and necessary. 

For this reason, even in the darkest hour of the struggle, 
neither his faith nor his courage ever faltered, as did that of 
many. This abundantly appears in his " Address to the 
Members of the Union Club," February 27, 1863, and in his 
" Letter to President Lincoln," on the 7tli of the following 
September, — remarkable in themselves, and still more so 

* The following extract from his Diary shows that he was not among those who 
counselled or favored extreme measures at tliis time: "January 23, 1857. — Received 
a letter inviting me to attend an Antislavery meeting, tiie avowed object of which is 
the dissolution of the National Union, — an object which I consider neither wise nor 
at present practicable. To all human appearance, the event is not far distant; but I 
have no sense of duty calling upon me to expedite it. I am not among those who 
believe that the separation of the Free from the Slave States would inevitabh' lead to 
the emancipation of the negroes, were it possible to unite all tiie Free States in such 
a separation. On the contrary, I believe the only hope, and that very shadowy, of 
emancipation, is from a continuance of the Union." 



MEMOIR OP JOSIAH QUINCY. 71 

when considered as the last solemn and public utterances 
of their author in his ninety-second year. He writes to the 
President : — 

" Negro slavery and the possibility of emancipation have been sub- 
jects of my thoughts for more than seventy years, being first intro- 
duced to it by the debates in the Convention of Massachusetts for 
adopting the Constitution, in 1788, which I attended. I had subse- 
quently opportunities of knowing the views on that subject, not only of 
such men as Hamilton, King, Jay, and Pickering, but also of distin- 
guished slaveholders, — of both the Pinckneys, of William Smith of 
South Carolina, and of many others. With the first of these I had per- 
sonal intercourse and acquaintance. I can truly say that I never knew 
the individual, slaveholder or non-slaveholder, who did not express 
a detestation of it, and the desire and disposition to get rid of it. The 
only difficulty in case of emancipation was. What shall we do for 
the master, and what .shall we do with the slave ? A satisfactory 
answer to both these questions has been, until now, beyond the reach 
and the grasp of human wisdom and power. 

" Through the direct influence of a good and gracious God, the 
people of the United States have been invested with the power of 
answering satisfactorily both these questions, and also of providing 
for the difficulties incident to both. . . . The madness of secession, 
and its inevitable consequence, civil war, will in their result give the 
right and the power of universal emancipation sooner or later. If 
the United States do not understand and fully appreciate the boon 
thus bestowed upon them, and fail to improve it to the extent of the 
power granted, they will prove recreant to themselves and posterity. 
I write under the impression that the victory of the United States in 
this war is inevitable." 

He did not live to see the Union restored ; hut his assur- 
ance of the event was entire. He even found in the delay 
itself a new reason for gratitude, as it could hardly fail to 
save the country from half-way measures, from a conclusion 
in which nothing was concluded, — the only thing he really 
feared. 

Old age, as we generally find it, is a dubious blessing; 
in Mr. Quincy it was singularly honored and hapjiy. A 



72 MEMOIR OP JOSIAH QUINCY. 

fall, when he was on the verge of ninety, injured his hip, so 
that afterwards he could not walk without assistance. Except- 
ing this, he seems hardlj to have known, from early child- 
hood, Avhat is meant by sickness or physical disability. To 
the very last, his bodily and mental faculties, his sight and 
hearing, his animal spirits, his interest in public affairs, in 
his family and friends, and even in the courtesies and ameni- 
ties of social life, were wonderfully preserved. His heart 
was as young and as brave at ninety as at thirty. And 
these facts are the more worthy of record, as they were 
manifestly the result of a strict observance of the laws of 
health. They show, moreover, that where these laws are 
properly attended to in other respects, nothing needs be ap- 
prehended from intense and long-continued activity of body 
and of mind. 

The respect felt and manifested for Mr. Quincy in his last 
years by the whole community was alike honorable to both. 
Party triumphs and party defeats, with the passions awak- 
ened thereby, were forgotten: all that the people knew, or 
cared to know, was, that they had among them a venerable 
man, who had passed through a long public life without hav- 
ing the uprightness of his intentions questioned in a single 
instance, and without a stain on his private character. Who 
that was present will ever forget the spontaneous enthusiasm 
with which the whole audience arose to welcome him on 
occasion of his last two public appearances at Cambridge? 
But the evening, however tranquil and beautiful, must have 
its lengthening shadows, its setting sun, its gathering gloom. 
During the summer the ancestral home in Quincy, and during 
the winter his house in Boston (first in Bowdoin Place, and 
afterwards in Park Street), continued to be resorted to by 
distinguished strangers and devoted friends, more and more 
eager to testify their regard ; but the companions of his 
youth and of his early manhood were not there. 

From the time of his leaving Cambridge until he was 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 73 

ninety, he amused himself by keeping a full journal of 
events, and of his own reading, both of which led to abun- 
dant and characteristic reflections on the present and the 
past.* As might be expected, the entries are often like 
the following : — 

" January 18, 1847. — Attended the funeral of the Hon. John Davis, 
aged eighty-six years. Mild, amiable, affectionate, possessed of every 
virtue. His life useful; his death easy and timely. Farewell, my 
friend of many years : our separation vv^ill be short. I shall soon be 
with you, and I doubt not we shall meet amidst locos Icetos sedesque 
beatas." 

" February 25, 1848. — I have to record the loss of the friend of my 
youth, of my manhood, and of my old age, John Quincy Adams, who 
died at the Capitol, in Washington, on the 23d instant, — on the spot 
where his eloquence had often triumphed, and where his worth and 
powers were known, and are now acknowledged. Death, which shuts 
the gate of envy and opens that of fame, has at length introduced him 
to the rewards of a life of purity, labor, and usefulness, spent in the 
service of his country. The language of sorrow and lamentation 
is universal. No tongue but speaks his praise, — well deserved, but 
hardly earned by a life of unceasing labor and untiring industry. 
Friend of my life, farewell. I owe you for many marks of favor and 
kindness ; many instances of your affection and interest for me are 
recorded in my memory, which death alone can obliterate. 

' Multis ille bonis flebilis occidit, 
Nulli flebilior quam 7«i7«'.' " 

This death was soon followed by another which touched 
him more nearly. His wife, who for more than half a cen- 
tury had shared all his thoughts and cares, and from whom, 
since his constrained absence in Washington, he had scarcely 
been separated a single day, closed on the 1st of September, 
1850, a long, useful, and happy life of seventy-seven years. 



* Almost everj' page bears witness to the pleasure Mr. Quincy continued to take 
in his classical studies. The Diary begins, indeed, with a free translation of " Cicero de 
Senectute;" and Cicero, Horace, and Tacitus appear to have been his constant com- 
panions to the end. His mind was evidently of the Roman cast. 

10 



74 MEMOIE OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

All his children, two sons and five daughters, survived, — 
three continuing to live with him, and relieving him from all 
domestic cares ; the others being settled in the neighborhood, 
and in a condition to render him the most delicate and grate- 
ful attentions. But he could not forget those who had gone 
before, and often spoke of the long-expected, long-deferred 
summons to join them, with a cheerfulness and naturalness 
which showed that his thoughts were equally at home in both 
worlds. At length the summons came. He died, peacefully 
and without sufiering, at his house in Quincy, on Friday after- 
noon, Jul}'^ 1, 1864, aged ninety-two years and five months. 
The funeral took place on the following Wednesday, at Ar- 
lington-street Church in Boston, his place of worship in the 
city. 

In looking back on this brief and imperfect memoir, what 
strikes us most of all is the degree of efiiciency and success 
attained by the subject of it in the widely different and ap- 
parently incongruous spheres of activity to which his life was 
devoted at successive periods, — first as a statesman and par- 
liamentary orator, then as a civil magistrate, and finally as 
the head of a college. The elder President Adams, who was 
his neighbor and kinsman, and had known him intimately from 
childhood, used to say, that he " was the most fortunate man 
he had ever known in his long life, — fortunate in his ances- 
tors, in his position in society, in his wife and children, in 
every thing ; indeed, the most remarkable instance of good 
fortune he had ever met with in his wide experience." 
These words, uttered nearly fifty years ago, continued equally 
true of him to the last, — most fortunate of all in a cheerful 
and active old age, in a peaceful death, and an unspotted 
name. 

After what has been said, a formal analysis of Mr. Quincy's 
character is unnecessary. He threw a vast amount of per- 
sonality into his outward life : so that to know his history is 
to know the man, — his excellences and his defects. To this 



MEMOIR OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 75 

statement there is, however, one exception, on which it will 
be proper to say a word. 

His religious character was entirely misconceived by those 
who were willing to regard him as a partisan for a particular 
creed or sect. In the division which took place among the 
Congregationalists of Massachusetts, in the early part of the 
present century, he sided with the Unitarians ; but he was 
not a man to lay much stress on theological speculations, or 
on ecclesiastical differences of any kind, or even on religious 
emotions or sympathy. With him religion consisted in bring- 
ing the desires, intentions, and thoughts into harmony with 
the Divine will. A man was a Christian, no matter what 
might be his denomination, just so far as, at home and abroad, 
in public and private life, he acted out Christian principles ; 
and no farther. 

" Religion," so he writes in his Diary, " is an act of the mind, and 
has no reference to place. It consists in studying our daily relations 
to God, and in endeavoring to discern and be obedient to his will ; 
and in cultivating in our minds a constant sense of his goodness and 
protection, and of the gratitude due to him for the infinite mercies of 
■which he is the source." ... 

" No years of my life have been more unqualifiedly joyful, than 
those since my seventieth year. I have lost many friends and com- 
rades. They have indeed gone a little before me ; but what of that ? 
I shall soon be up with them. And I doubt not I shall join them, 
and that we shall travel on together in a future life ; and this tempo- 
rary separation will be but an incident, and not a cause of serious 
regret. This assured expectation is a never-failing source of comfort 
and happiness to the well-balanced mind of an old man." . . . 

" Whatever is conformable to nature ought to be regarded as 
good ; and what is more conformable than that old men should die ? 
When death happens to the young, they seem to yield to an external 
force ; but the old pass voluntarily away, as if by their own will. 
To me the approach of death is rather pleasant than otherwise. I 
seem to see land after a long navigation." 

Who would not have the evening of his days made tranquil 



76 MEMOIE OF JOSIAH QUINCY. 

and bright by like memories and prospects, by a like calm, 
natural, and sincere trust? The wonder is, that, while his 
faith had almost become vision, he continued as indifferent as 
ever to the doctrinal and ritualistic controversies which have 
done so much to vex and divide the Church, and indeed to all 
outward tests of piety except obedience and character. One 
who knew him well has said, " While his moral constitution 
kept him from all false display, the structure of his mind, as 
it seems to me, compelled him to bestow his attention on the 
logical and practical, rather than on the sentimental, aspects 
of religion. He went as far as he saw reason to go, and there 
paused, in submission to an ignorance inseparable from the 
present conditions of our being."* What he thought of 
the use and necessity of the Christian revelation, to society 
and government, is best expressed in his own memorable 
words: ''Human happiness has no perfect security but free- 
dom ; freedom, none but virtue ; virtue, none but knowledge ; 
and neither freedom nor virtue nor knowledge has any vigor 
or immortal hope, except in the principles of the Christian 
faith, and in the sanctions of the Christian religion." 



* Dr. Gannett's " Discourse, occasioned bj^ the Death of the Hon. Josiah Quincy," 
p. 15. 



LE fylv '09 



MEMOIR 


(IF 

JOSIAH QUINCY. 


1 

nv 


J 

JAMES WALKER, D.D. 


4tfrom tbr " IJrorcrbtngs of tijt ||Tassutl)uscttsi jlistorical ^Socictn " 


For 1866-1867. 


CAMBRIDGE: 


rRINTED BY JOHN WILSON AND SON. 


1867. 



